'^r^ 


♦  . 


IMAGE  EVALUATION 
TEST  TARGET  (MT-S) 


& 


A 


/. 


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Zd 

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I.I 


1.25 


S  «f  1 

tii   lu 

Hf   U£    III  2.0 


12.2 


U    IIIIII.6 


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Hiotogiiaphic 

Sciences 

Corporation 


33  WIST  MAIN  STRHT 

WIBSTIR,  N.Y.  14S80 

(716)  •7i-4S03 


/> 


^t  ^° 


7. 


CIHM/ICMH 

Microfiche 

Series. 


CIHIVI/ICIVIH 
Collection  de 
microfiches. 


Canadian  Institute  for  Historical  Microreproductions  /  Institut  Canadian  de  microreproductions  historiques 


Ttchnical  and  Bibliographic  IMotas/Notas  tachniquas  at  bibliographiquas 


Tha  Instituta  haa  attamptad  to  obtain  tha  baat 
original  copy  availabia  for  filming.  Faaturaa  of  thia 
copy  which  may  ba  bibliographically  uniqua, 
which  may  altar  any  of  tha  imagaa  in  tha 
raproduction,  or  which  may  significantly  ctianga 
tha  usual  mathod  of  filming,  ara  chackad  bolow. 


m 


D 


n 


D 

n 


D 


n 


Colourad  covars/ 
Couvarturo  da  coulaur 


I — I    Covars  damagad/ 


Couvartura  andommagia 


□   Covars  rastorad  and/or  laminatad/ 
Couvartura  rastaurte  at/ou  palliculte 


Covar  titia  missing/ 

La  titra  da  couvartura  manqua 


r~l    Colourad  maps/ 


Cartas  gtegraphiquas  en  coulaur 


Colourad  ink  (i.a.  othar  than  blua  or  black)/ 
Encra  da  coulaur  (i.a.  autra  qua  blaue  ou  noira) 


[~n    Colourad  platas  and/or  illustrations/ 


Planchas  at/ou  illustrations  9n  coulaur 


Bound  with  othar  matorial/ 
Ralii  avac  d'autras  documants 


Tight  binding  may  causa  shadows  or  distortion 
along  intarior  margin/ 

La  rs  liura  sarrAa  paut  causar  da  I'ombra  ou  da  la 
distoraion  la  long  da  la  marga  int^riaura 

Blank  laavas  addad  during  rastoration  may 
appaar  within  tha  taxt.  Whanavar  possibla.  thasa 
hava  baan  omittad  from  filming/ 
II  sa  paut  qua  cartainaa  pagas  blanchas  aioutias 
lors  d'una  rastauration  apparaisaant  dans  la  taxta, 
mala,  lorsqua  cala  itait  possibla.  cas  pagaa  n'ont 
paa  «ti  fitmias. 

Additional  commants:/ 
Commantairas  supplAmantairas; 


L'Institut  a  microfilm^  la  maillaur  exemplaire 
qu'il  lui  a  6ti  possibla  da  sa  procurar.  Les  details 
dm  cat  axamplaire  qui  sont  paut-dtra  uniquas  du 
point  da  vua  bibliographiqua.  qui  peuvent  modifier 
una  imaga  reproduita,  ou  qui  pauvant  exiger  una 
modification  dans  la  m^thoda  normala  da  filmaga 
sont  indiqute  ci-dassous. 


I — I   Colourad  pagas/ 


D 


Pagaa  da  coulaur 

Pagas  damagad/ 
Pagaa  andommagAas 

Pagas  rastorad  and/oi 

Pagas  rastaurias  at/ou  palliculies 

Pagas  discolourad.  stainad  or  foxai 
Pagas  dicolorias,  tachatias  ou  piqudes 

Pagas  datachad/ 
Pagas  ditach^as 

Showthrough/ 
Transparanca 

Quality  of  prir 

QuaiitA  inigaia  da  I'imprassion 

Includas  supplamantary  matarii 
Comprand  du  matiriat  suppi^mantaira 

Only  adition  avaiiabia/ 
Saula  Mition  disponibia 


r~~1  Pagas  damagad/ 

p~|  Pagas  rastorad  and/or  laminated/ 

r~^  Pagas  discolourad.  stained  or  foxed/ 

I      I  Pagas  detached/ 

ryj  Showthrough/ 

r~~|  Quality  of  print  varies/ 

r~~l  Includes  supplementary  material/ 

n~|  Only  edition  avaiiabla/ 


Th 
to 


Th 
po 
of 


Or 
ba 
th< 
sia 
ott 
fin 
sia 
or 


Th( 
shi 

Tir 

wh 

Ma 
dif^ 
ant 
bac 
rigt 
raq 
ma 


Pagas  wholly  or  partially  obscured  by    rrata 
slips,  tissues,  etc.,  have  been  rsfilmed  to 
ensure  the  best  possible  image/ 
Lee  pagas  totalament  ou  partiallement 
obscurcies  par  un  feuillet  d'errata,  una  pelure, 
etc..  ont  M  filmies  A  nouveau  da  faqon  A 
obtanir  la  mailleure  imaga  possibla. 


This  item  is  filmed  at  tha  reduction  ratio  checked  below/ 

Ce  document  est  filmA  au  taux  da  reduction  indiquA  ci-dassous. 


10X 

14X 

18X 

22X 

26X 

30X 

J 

12X 


16X 


20X 


24X 


28X 


32X 


laire 
s  details 
:|ues  du 
It  modifier 
:iger  une 
e  filmage 


Th«  copy  filmed  hare  has  bean  raproducad  tlianks 
to  tha  ganaroaity  of: 

McLennan  Library 
McGill  University 
IVIontreal 

Tha  imagas  appearing  hara  ara  tha  baat  quality 
possibia  considaring  tha  condition  and  lagibillty 
of  tha  original  copy  and  in  icaaping  with  tha 
flaming  contract  spacificationa. 


L'axamplaira  filmA  fut  raproduit  grAca  d  la 
g^nirosltt  da: 

McLennan  Library 
McGill  University 
Montreal 

Las  imagaa  suivantaa  ont  tti  raproduitas  avac  la 
plua  grand  soin,  compta  tanu  da  la  condition  at 
da  la  nattatA  da  Taxampiaira  film*,  at  an 
conformity  avac  las  conditions  du  contrat  da 
filmaga. 


1/ 
udes 


Original  copiaa  in  printed  paper  covers  are  filmed 
beginning  with  the  front  cover  and  ending  on 
the  last  page  with  a  printed  or  illuatratad  imprea- 
sion,  or  the  bacic  cover  when  appropriate.  All 
other  original  copies  ara  filmed  beginning  on  the 
first  page  with  a  printed  or  illustrated  imprea- 
sion,  and  ending  on  the  last  page  with  a  printed 
or  Illustrated  impression. 


Lee  exemplairee  origineux  dont  la  couvarture  en 
papier  eat  imprimte  sent  filmte  an  commanpant 
par  la  premier  plat  at  en  termlnant  soit  par  la 
derniAre  page  qui  comporte  une  empreinte 
d'impreaaion  ou  d'iiiustration,  soit  par  la  second 
plat,  salon  la  cas.  Tous  lee  autras  exemplairee 
origineux  sont  flimte  an  commanpant  par  la 
pramlAre  page  qui  comporte  une  empreinte 
d'impreaaion  ou  d'lllustration  at  an  terminant  par 
la  darnlAre  page  qui  comporte  une  telle 
empreinte. 


The  laat  recorded  frame  on  each  microfiche 
shall  contain  the  symbol  —»■  (meaning  "CON- 
TINUED"), or  the  symbol  y  (meaning  "END"), 
whichever  applies. 


Un  des  symbolee  suivants  apparaftra  sur  la 
darnlAre  image  de  cheque  microfiche,  selon  le 
cas:  le  symbols  — »•  signifie  "A  SUIVRE",  le 
symbols  ▼  signifie  "FIN". 


ire 


ly   Trata 
ed  to 

nt 

na  pelure, 

iqon  i 


32X 


Mapa,  plataa,  charts,  etc.,  may  be  filmed  at 
different  reduction  ratioa.  Thoaa  too  large  to  be 
entirely  included  In  one  expoaura  ara  filmed 
beginning  in  the  upper  left  hand  corner,  left  to 
right  and  top  to  bottom,  as  many  framea  aa 
required.  The  following  diagrama  illustrate  the 
method: 


1 

2 

3 

Lea  cartea,  planchaa,  tableaux,  etc.,  peuvent  Atre 
filmAa  A  dee  taux  de  reduction  diff Arents. 
Lorsque  le  document  est  trop  grend  pour  Atre 
reproduit  en  un  seui  cllchA,  ii  est  filmA  A  partir 
da  I'angle  supArleur  gauche,  de  geuche  A  droite, 
et  de  haut  en  bee,  en  prenant  la  nombre 
d'imegea  nAcaasaira.  i.as  diagrammea  suivants 
illuatrent  la  mAthoda. 


1 

2 

3 

4 

5 

6 

* 


MSGILL 

UNIVERSITY 

LIBRARY 


! 


X, 


x<  N 


:^ 


^ 

^ 


A 


Ljayil^rd  =:! 


(^me  Physical  CharacUrisHcs  of  Native  Tribes  of  Canada. 


ADDRESS 


BT 


DANIEL  WILSON,  LL.D.,  F.R.S.E., 


VicK  President,  Section  H. 


BCrORB  TBK 


SECTION  OF  ANTHROPOLOGY, 


AMERICAN  ASSOCIATION  FOB  THE  ADVANCEMENT  OF  SCIENCE, 


AT  MONTREAL,  CANADA, 


AUGUST,   1882. 


Boprlnted  ftom  Vol.  XXXI,  of  the  Proceedinga  A.  A.  A.  S. 


-^         SALEM : 

PRINTED  AT  THE  SALEM  PRESS. 
1882. 


/ 


'■■^'T-'i^imitifiumf'k 


!j|||illM^i»l|illfiklriiii,ii.,. 


'(:-     t-i.!|.3 


Some  Physical  Characteristics  of  Native  Tribes  of  Canada. 


ADDRESS 


BT 


DANIEL  WILSON,  LL.D.,  F.R.S.E., 


Vice  President,  Section  H. 


BEFORE  THE 


SECTION  OF  ANTHROPOLOGY, 


AMERICAN  ASSOCIATION  FOR  THE  ADVANCEMENT  OF  SCIENCE, 


AT  MONTREAL,  CANADA, 


AUGUST,  1882. 


Roprintud  from  Vol.  XXXI,  of  the  Proceediuga  A.  A.  A,  S. 


SALEM : 

PRINTED  AT  THE  SALEM  PRESS. 

1882. 


*.'"" M" 


mmmmmmmmmteSHSSM 


{/ 


il 


' '•  ■■'"  I  II  II  iiiiMMMiii •^4 


it  cai:^^. 


i/ 


or 


J^ 


ADDRESS 


BY 


DANIEL  WILSON,  LL.D.,  R  R.  S.  E.. 


VICE  PRESIDENl,  SECTION  11, 


SOME  PHYSICAL  CHARACTERISTICS  OF  NATIVE 
TRIBES  OF  CANADA. 

In  welcoming  the  Anthropological  Section  of  the  American 
Association  for  the  Advancement  of  Science  to  its  meeting 
here  on  Canadian  soil,  it  will  not,  I  trust,  appear  unsuitable  to  the 
occasion,  if  I  invite  attention  to  some  of  the  physical  character- 
istics which  distinguish  certain  native  races  of  the  Dominion  ; 
and  especially  to  the  significance  of  certain  typical  head-forms, 
and  theiv  bearing  on  our  special  researches  in  reference  to  the 
origin,  distribution,  and  classification  of  rac'3s. 

In  so  doing,  it  is  important  to  keep  in  view  the  prevalence 
throughout  the  American  continent  of  varioils  artificial  modifica- 
tions of  skull-forms.  This  strange  custom  is  probably  at  the  present 
time  carried  on  more  systematically  among  tlie  different  tribes  of 
Flathead  Indians  of  British  Columbia,  than  in  iny  other  region  ; 
though  abundant  evidence  exists  to  show  its  prevalence  both  in 
past  and  present  times  among  many  tribes  and  nations  in  very 
dirterent  stages  of  progress,  alike  in  Norti  and  South  America. 
It  has,  indeed,  attracted  more  general  attention  than  most  other 
characteristic  practices  of  the  American  aborigines,  owing  to  its 
prevalence  alike  among  the  most  barbarous  and  the  most  civilized 
races.     To  all  appearance  the  Teruvians  aud  Mexicans  had  devel- 

(8) 


*rw^' 


■^wr 


»^^%. 


f 


4  ADDRESS   BT   DANIiL   WILSON, 

oped  independent  phases  of  progress  in  arts,  science,  and  social 
policy,  witlioiit  anj'  knowledge  of  eacli  other.  Nevertheless,  we 
trace  the  singular  practice  of  moulding  the  human  head  into  ab- 
normal forms,  alike  among  the  civilized  races  of  Peru,  the  ancient 
lettered  architects  of  Central  America  and  Mexico,  and  among 
barbarous  tribes  both  to  the  east  and  west  of  the  Rocky  Moun- 
tains. The  earthworks  of  the  Mississippi  Valley  Mound-builders 
have  been  found  to  cover  artificially  flattened  crania  ;  and  the  stu- 
dent of  American  native  civilization,  as  he  turns  from  pondering 
over  the  bas-reliefs  and  hieroglyphics  on  the  sculptured  slabs  of 
Palenque  and  Uxmal,  is  startled  to  find  that  the  cranial  forms  and 
strange  physiognomical  contour  of  the  architectural  race  of  Cen- 
tral America  are  reproduced  among  some  of  the  most  barbarous 
living  tribes  of  Oregon  and  British  Columbia.  But,  now  that 
the  study  of  craniology  has  been  carried  out  by  many  intelligent 
observers,  the  fact  is  becoming  familiar  to  us  that  artificial  cranial 
deformation  is  no  peculiarity  of  the  American  continent,  either  in 
ancient  or  modern  times.  The  compressed  crania  of  the  Asiatic 
Macrocephali  attracted  the  attention  of  Hippocrates  five  centuries 
before  the  Christian  era ;  and  Blumenbach,  the  foremost  of  Euro- 
pean craniologists,  figured  in  the  first  fasciculus  of  his  "Decades 
Craniorum,"  in  1 790,  an  imperfect  compressed  skull,  received  by  him 
from  Russia,  with  the  information  that  it  was  probably  that  of  a 
Tartar.  This  he  unhesitatingly  designated  an  Asiatic  Macro- 
cephalus.  The  conclusion  thus  arrived  at  has  been  sustained  by 
subsequent  discoveries ;  and  as  attention  is  more  widely  directed 
to  the  general  subject  the  results  are  found  to  have  a  special  value 
for  the  American  ethnologist. 

It  seems  probable  that  the  name  of  Macrocephali,  like  that  of 
our  own  Flatheads,  did  not  properly  belong  to  any  single  tribe,  or 
even  distinct  race  of  ancient  Asia  ;  but  had  its  origi  i  in  the  effort, 
by  artificial  means,  to  produce  the  patrician  head-form,  primarily 
characteristic  of  some  dominant,  or  conquering  race.  Among  the 
Chinooks  and  other  Flathead  tribes  of  this  continent,  an.i  also, 
as  I  believe,  among  the  ancient  builder-races  of  Yucatan  and 
Peru,  certain  head-forms  were  recognized  as  an  attribute  of  the 
ruling  cast.  Within  the  Flathead  area  of  British  Columbia  the 
compressed  and  distorted  skull  is  even  now  the  symbol  of  aris- 
tocracy ;  and  adopted  captives,  or  slaves,  are  precluded  from  giv- 
iug  the  prized  deformity  to  their  ofl'spriug.     Hippocrates  refers  in 


^ 


i 


"■'^'I'sffll!!''.,,!':!!! 


ler 


KiWM 


SECTION   OF   ANTHROPOLOGY. 


^ 


( 


his  "De  Aere,  Aquis,  et  Locis,"  to  the  Macrocephali  as  a  people 
among  whom  "those  are  tliought  the  most  noble  who  have  the 
longest  heads."  Skulls  of  this  tjpe  have  been  recovered  in  recent 
years  from  ancient  graves  in  the  Crimean  Bosphorus,  and  the  val- 
ley of  the  Don.  Still  more  illustrative  of  the  effort  at  superin- 
ducing a  novel  dolichocephalic  form  among  races  of  brachycephalic 
type,  are  the  examples  of  compressed  Hun  or  Avar  skulls  found 
from  time  to  time  on  the  line  of  march  of  the  great  Hunish  in- 
vasions of  Europe  in  the  fifth  and  sixth  centuries.  One  of  the 
first  examples  of  such  mediaeval  compressed  crania  which  attracted 
special  attention  in  Europe  was  a  skull  found,  in  the  year  1820, 
at  Fuersbrunn,  near  Grafenegg,  in  Austria.  Count  August  von 
lireuner,  the  proprietor  of  the  soil,  acquired  possession  of  the  in- 
teresting relic,  and  at  once  ascribed  it  to  the  Avarian  Huns,  who 
occupied  that  region  from  the  middle  of  tiie  sixth  until  the  eighth 
century.  Of  this  compressed  Avar  skull,  Retzius  gave  a  descrip- 
tion in  the  proceedings  of  the  Royal  Academj^  of  Sciences  of 
Stockholm,  in  1844 ;  and  showed  that  t!>?  skull,  which  had  been 
regarded  as  remarkable  for  its  great  elongation,  was  in  reality  a 
true  brachycephalic  skull,  such  as  the  Mongol  allinities  of  the  Avars 
would  suggest,  but  tiiat  by  artificial  compression  it  had  been  elon- 
gated, vertically,  or  rather  obliquely.  An  additional  interest  is 
conferred  on  this  European  example  of  artificial  crania!  deforma- 
tion by  tlic  fact  that  scientific  observers  were  persuaded  n*  a  time 
to  regard  it,  not  as  European,  but  as  an  intrusive  Ani'  '  ex- 
ample, brought  thither  soon  after  the  discovery  of  this  ent. 
The  well  known  traveller  Dr.  Tschudi  communicated  to  i\i  r's 
"Archiv  fiir  Anatomie"  a  memoir,  in  which  he  instituted  a  compari- 
son between  this  Grafenegg  skull  and  the  compressed  crania  of  an- 
cient Peruvian  cemeteries,  whence  he  arrived  at  the  conclusion  that 
scientific  men  had  been  deceived  in  ascribing  to  any  Asiatic 
or  European  source  a  skull  which  must  have  been  originally  de- 
rived from  Pern.  In  confirmation  of  this,  he  recalled  the  fact  that, 
widely  as  Austria  and  Peru  are  now  severed,  in  the  sixteenth  cen- 
tury the  Emperor  Charles  V  embraced  both  within  his  dominions. 
He  accordingly  conceived  it  no  improbable  conjecture  that  the 
compressed  skull  was  brought  to  Europe,  as  an  object  of  curi- 
osity ;  and  being  afterwards  tlirown  aside,  it  was  mistakenly  as- 
sumeil  to  poruain  to  native  sepulture  when  recovered  at  Fuersbrunn 
in  the  present  century. 


9m 


r^ 


6 


ADDRESS    BY    DANIEL    WILSON, 


More  recent  discoveries  of  artificially  compressed  crania  on 
European  sites,  liave  removed  all  doubts  of  their  native,  or  intru- 
sive Asiatic  origin.  It  tlius  appears  that  tlie  barbarous  i)ractice  is 
neither  recent,  nor  peculiar  to  the  New  World.  Neither  to  Am- 
erica nor  to  Europe  do  those  examples  of  mediaeval  and  ancient 
compressed  crania  really  belong,  but  seemingly  to  the  nomad 
Mongols  and  Ugrians  of  the  steppes  of  Nortliern  Asia,  in  the  vast 
wilds  of  which  we  lose  them  as  they  spread  away  eastward  toward 
the  Okhotsk  Sea  and  the  Aleutian  Islands.  We  are  thus  guided 
by  unmistakable  indications  backward,  as  it  seems,  on  this  ancient 
trail,  down  the  valley  of  tlie  Danube,  and  beyond  the  Caspian  and 
the  Ural  Mountains,  to  a  region  outside  the  farthest  limits  assigned 
by  Hippocrates,  Strabo,  Pliny,  or  Mela,  to  the  Asiatic  Maeio- 
cephali ;  and  recover  traces  of  the  strange  practice  of  the  Amer- 
ican Flatheads  fiir  to  the  northeast  of  the  Altai  chain,  in  the  val- 
leys that  skirt  the  Yablonoi  mountains,  as  they  trend  eastward 
towards  the  Okhotsk  Sea.  It  may  indeed  be  an  American  practice 
which  Asia  borrowed,  for  the  alFinities  of  race  between  the 
tribes  of  the  islands  and  Asiatic  mainland  immediately  to  the  west 
of  Behring  strait  point  to  a  migration  to  Asia  from  America. 
Such,  however,  is  limited  and  exceptional.  On  evidence  which 
embraces  the  ethnical  characteristics  of  a  very  wide  Asiatic  area, 
the  Mongolian  classification  of  the  American  Indian  is  confirmed 
by  many  significant  points  of  resemblance  in  form,  color,  texture 
of  hair,  and  peculiar  customs  and  traits  of  character,  which  fail  us 
when  we  turn  either  to  the  Asiatic  Aleutians,  tlie  NamoUos,  and 
other  allied  tribes  of  the  older  continent,  or  to  the  true  Eskimo. 
The  striking  resemblance  noted  by  Humboldt  as  existing  between 
the  American  race  and  the  Mongols  of  Asia,  received  independent 
confirmation  from  Dr.  Charles  Pickering,  as  the  result  of  his  ex- 
tensive observation  of  the  races  of  botli  continents,  in  his  capacity 
of  ethnologist  to  the  American  Exploring  Expedition.  Such  affini- 
ties are  still  further  confirmed,  as  we  recover  the  traces  of  the 
singular  practice  of  r-anial  deformation  extending  in  ancient  and 
mediaeval  times  eastward  from  the  Euxine  and  beyond  the  Altai 
mountains.  To  those  little-known  areas  of  northern  Asia  the 
ethnologist  and  the  archaiologist  have  jet  to  turn  in  quest  of 
tlie  footprints  of  one  of  the  immigrant  routes  to  the  new  world. 
Tliere  it  is,  in  the  vast  unknown  regions  of  Asiatic  Russia,  that  wo 
may  hope  to  recover  evidence  confirmatory  of  at  least  one  source 
of  the  Asiatic  rohitions  of  the  American  race. 


! 


\ 


rya^/orc/^ 


V 


SECTION   OF    ANTHROPOLOOY.  7 

It  is  now  a  recognized  fact  that  the  artificial  head-forms  clmrac- 
teristic  of  diverse  tribes  of  Nortli  and  South  America  vary  greatly, 
from  the  extreme  depressed  forehead  and  laterally  compressed 
skulls  of  races  that  rivalled  the  ancient  Macrocephali  in  their  esti- 
mation that  "the  most  noble  are  those  who  have  the  longest 
heads,"  to  some  among  the  Cowlitz  or  Chinook  tribes  of  British 
Columbia,  whose  heads  are  compressed  into  a  flattened  disk.  The 
two  artificial  extremes  find  their  analogues  in  the  distinct  ethnical 
divisions  of  dolichocephalic  and  brachycephalic  head-forms  among 
well-known  northern  tribes.  The  predominant  natural  form,  char- 
acterislic  of  the  more  southern  tribes  of  North  America,  appears 
to  have  been  brachycephalic,  or,  as  it  is  sometimes  called,  globular. 
But  along  the  regions  of  the  great  lakes,  in  the  valley  of  the  St.  Law- 
rence, and  northward  throughout  the  whole  Eskimo  area,  the  dolicho- 
cephalic head-form  prevails.  The  native  races  of  the  Dominion, 
and  especially  the  earliest  known  aborigines  of  Upper  and  Lower 
Canada,  including  the  province  in  which  you  are  now  met,  appear 
to  have  been  all  of  the  same  dolichocephalic  type  ;  and  so  to  have 
formed  a  class  markedly  distinct  from  the  short,  or  globular  headed 
races  of  the  south,  whose  head-form  was  long  regarded  as  typical 
of  the  whole  American  race.  Of  the  Indians  of  Hochelaga,  first 
met  by  Cartier,  in  1535,  we  are  able  to  judge  from  crania  recovered 
from  their  cemeteries.  The  palisaded  Indian  town  of  Hochelaga 
occupied,  in  the  sixteenth  century,  the  site  where  we  are  now  as- 
sembled ;  and  in  the  museum  of  McGill  College  may  be  seen  ex- 
amples of  the  crania,  as  well  as  specimens  of  the  Hint  implements 
and  pottery  dug  up  on  its  site.  Its  traces  revcj'lod  notliing  sug- 
gestive of  any  other  rudiments  of  civilization  than  have  long  been 
familiar  to  the  American  student  of  primitive  arts  in  the  abundant 
remains  of  Indian  settlements  throughout  the  area  of  the  eastern 
States,  and  on  the  sites  of  the  Iroquois  Confederacjf  in  the  State 
of  New  York.  Their  earthenware  pots  and  bowls  of  various  sizes 
were  decorated  with  rude  yet  tasteful  incised  patterns ;  and  the 
handles  were  further  ingeniously  modelled  at  times  into  human  and 
animal  forms.  Tobacco  pipes  also,  both  of  stone  and  earthenware, 
here  as  elsewhere,  were  special  objects  of  artistic  ornamentation. 
Stone  and  flint  implements,  bone  needles  and  bodkins,  also 
abounded  ;  l»ut  of  metal  only  very  rare  traces  of  the  cold-wrought 
coi)per  tool  gave  any  indication  of  even  the  first  rudiments  of 
metallurgic  art.     In  truth,  Canada  has  no  such  evidences,  even  of 


{jff*llS!»^ 


ADDRESS   BY   DANIEL   WILSON, 


,1 


an  incipient  native  civilization,  as  the  remarkable  earthworks  which 
abound  in  the  great  river  valleys  to  the  south  of  Lake  Erie.  To 
all  appearance,  through  unnumbered  centuries,  the  tide  of  human 
life  has  ebbed  and  flowed,  to  the  north  of  these  great  lakes,  and  in 
■  he  valley  of  the  St.  Lawrence,  as  unprogressively  as  on  the  great 
steppes  of  Asia,  among  !,he  Bedouin  tribes  of  the  Arabian  penin- 
sula, or  around  the  tropical  lakes  of  equatorial  Africa.  Such  foot- 
prints as  the  wanderers  have  left  on  the  sands  of  time  tell  us  no 
more  than  the  ripples  on  the  sea  beach,  and  are  indeed  still  more 
evanescent.  Nevertheless,  in  all  their  distinctive  characteristics, 
the  tribes  of  our  Canadian  forests  and  prairies  present  much  in 
common  with  those  by  whom  the  whole  area  of  this  northern  con- 
tinent, southward  to  the  Gulf  of  ]Mexico,  appears  to  have  been  oc- 
cupied when  first  brought  under  the  notice  of  European  explorers. 

It  is  indeed  a  noticeable  fact  in  reference  to  the  entire  popula- 
tion of  this  western  hemisphere,  throughout  areas  so  widely  dif- 
fering in  climate  and  physi'ial  geography  as  are  embraced  within 
the  region  extending  from  the  arctic  circle  to  Terra  del  Fuego, 
that  the  ethnical  diversities  are  sligiit  when  compared  with  those 
which  pertain  to  what,  historically  speaking,  are  the  older  conti- 
nents. It  seems  to  force  on  us  the  conclusion  that,  however  re- 
motely we  may  trace  our  vftiy  back  into  unrecorded  centuries,  ere 
we  reach  the  time  when  man  made  his  first  appearance  heve,  so 
far  as  the  multiplication  of  diverse  racial  varieties  afford  any 
evidence,  it  is  recent  when  compared  with  the  peopling  of  the  an- 
cieiit  world.  To  this  indeed  one  mportant  exception  has  been 
suggested  in  the  assumption  of  a  direct  affinity  between  the  hyper- 
borean tribes  of  this  continent  and  the  men  of  Europe's  jiaheo- 
lithic  era  ;  and  I  shall  accordingly  refer  to  it  in  its  bearings  on  the 
general  conclusions  to  which  we  are  thus  led. 

Great,  however,  as  is  the  superficial  resemblance  which  seems 
to  pervade  the  diverse  tribes  of  tiio  American  continent,  some  of 
the  underlying  ditlerences  were  noted  from  the  first.  Columbus, 
with  an  eye  quick  to  discern  all  that  was  peculiar  in  the  novel 
scenes  on  which  he  was  the  first  to  gaze,  failed  not  to  note  the 
marked  distinction  between  the  fair  complexion  of  the  Guauches, 
who  were  brought  under  his  notice  on  his  first  voyage,  and  the 
roddish-olivo  of  the  ferocious  Ciirihs.  Apart  from  this  purely 
physical  distinction,  those  Guauches  attracted  his  attention  by 
their  gentle  manners  and  inolTensive  hub'ts.  From  them  he  learned 


'^/■"'•WftllWJ 


iworks  which 
:e  Eric.     To 
:le  of  human 
akes,  and  in 
on  the  great 
ibian  penin- 
Such  foot- 
e  tell  us  no 
d  still  more 
racteristics, 
nt  much  in 
)rthern  con- 
ive  been  oc- 
»  explorers, 
bire  popula- 
widely  dif- 
Lced  within 
del  Fiiego, 
with  those 
Ider  conti- 
owever  re- 
ituries,  ere 
c  here,  so 
aftbrd  any 
of  the  an- 
I  has  been 
the  hyper- 
e's  paheo- 
iigs  on  the 

ch  seems 
,  some  of 
Columbus, 
the  novel 
note  tlie 
•Mauchcs, 
,  imd  the 
is  purely 
ntiou  by 
e  learned 


d^l^ra  =si 


-'-'vVa' '  ■tii^^iR«ai--v»iwMili'i'''wiiil'&i','t-*gwa»I^Ji 


SECTION    OF    ANTHROPOLOCfY. 


9 


of  the  Caribs,  as  a  fierce,  warlike  people  occupying  the  neigh- 
bouring islands  and  the  mainhuid,  of  win  they  lived  in  constant 
dread  ;  and  who  subsequently  became  fai.,iliar  to  the  Spaniards  as 
a  ferocious,  crafty,  and  revengeful  race,  delighting  in  cannibalism. 
Hence  we  perceive  that  from  the  first  both  physical  and  moral  dif- 
ferences, of  a  sufficiently  marked  character,  were  observed  among 
native  tribesi  of  the  New  World.  Nor  indeed  did  Humboldt, 
or  even  Morton,  entirely  overlook  the  existence  of  considerable 
varieties  in  color  and  complexion,  from  nearly  white  to  a  dark 
brown  ;  though  they  were  led,  from  diflerent  causes,  to  under- 
estimate the  extent  of  diversity  prevailing  among  the  widelj'  scat- 
tered nations  of  North  and  South  America. 

But  while  it  is  deserving  of  notice  that  the  aborigines  of 
Canada  do  differ  in  certain  physical  chanicteristics  from  those 
especially  of  the  more  southern  states  of  Noith  America,  it  is 
undoubtedly  true  that  an  approximate  correspondence  in  eth- 
nical characteristics  is  common  to  manj-  tribes  both  of  North 
and  South  America.  It  is  not,  therefore,  to  bo  wondered  at  that  the 
idea  of  their  constituting  one  native  stock  distinct  from  all  the  races 
of  the  Old  World,  and  agreeing  in  the  possession  of  physical 
characteristics  peculiar  to  themselves,  should  have  been  accejjted 
for  a  time  as  indisputable.  Tlie  vague  generalizations  of  trav- 
ellers, and  the  current  forms  of  popular  belief,  however,  gradu- 
ally accpiired  consistency  as  an  accepted  canon  of  ethnical  sci- 
ence ;  until,  in  the  final  embodiment  of  Dr.  Morton's  matured 
opinions,  be  allirmed  the  American  race  to  be  essentially  separate 
and  peculiar,  and  with  no  obvious  links,  such  as  he  could  discern, 
between  tliem  and  the  people  of  the  old  world,  but  a  race  distinct 
from  all  otiiers. 

Tiiu  gc(>grai)hical  facilities  for  intermixture  among  the  very 
diverse  races  of  Asia,  Africa,  and  Euro|)e,  account  for  many  in- 
termediate and  transitional  races ;  but  this  increases  rather  than 
diminishes  the  dilliculty  of  referring  to  any  satislactory  souice,  such 
primary  types  of  extreme  divorsily  as  the  Negro,  15erl)er,  Mongol, 
Malay,  Aralt,  and  Saxon.  Here,  on  the  contrary,  so  far  as  now 
api)cars,  approximate  types  were  hemmed  in  between  the  Atlantic 
arid  the  I'acilic  ;  ami  in  so  far  as  they  unermingled,  the  tendency 
necessarily  was  to  diminisii,  if  Jiot  to  efiace,  any  >5irongly  marked 
distinct  ions  ;  just  as,  in  |)rei>istoric  centuries,  the  blending  of  liio 
aboriginal  savage  witli  intruding  races  is  assumed  to  have  begot- 
l* 


WPk'13M 


wasm^T 


!   n   i 


1  IV 


10 


ADDRESS  BY   DANIEL   WILSON, 


ten  the  Mclanocroi  and  the  Xanthocroi  of  Europe's  ethnological 
classification. 

Here,  undoubtedly,  as  well  as  in  Europe  and  Asia,  extreme 
diversities  have  been  modified  ;  but  from  the  first  these  diff*  rences 
must  have  extended  over  a  narrower  range  on  the  American  con- 
tinent than  that  which  finds  such  curious  illustration  in  the  an- 
cient sculpture  and  paintings  of  the  Nile  valley.  The  baso-relievos 
of  Yucatan,  the  terra  cottas  of  Mexico,  and  the  pottery  of  Peru, 
furnish  analogous  evidence  of  considerable  diversity  of  type 
among  the  prehistoric,  as  well  as  the  historic  and  civilized  races 
of  the  New  "World.  Nevertheless,  after  the  fullest  recognition  of 
all  that  such  evidence  indicates,  the  fact  remains  that  great  as  is 
the  divergence  of  the  Eskimo  from  the  Mexican,  or  the  Peruvian 
from  the  Patagonian,  the  difference  becomes  almost  insignificant 
in  comparison  with  that  which  distinguishes  the  Aryan  Hindo 
from  the  Andaman  Islander,  the  Arab  from  the  Chinese,  or  the  in- 
sular Malay  from  the  Negritto.  Yet  all  of  those  pertain  to  a  con- 
tinent which  is  only  separated  from  our  own  by  Behring  Strait. 
So  noticeable  indeed  is  the  prevailing  correspondence  in  ethnical 
characteristics  among  the  various  races  of  this  continent,  that  the 
elements  of  diversity  were  long  overlooked,  even  by  acute  scien- 
tific observers.  Malte  lirun  aflirmed  as  the  result  of  a  long  course 
of  observation,  "  that  the  Americans,  whatever  their  origin  may 
be,  constitute  at  the  present  day  a  race  essentially  difi'erent  from 
the  rest  of  mankind."  A  more  notable  authority,  possessed  alike 
of  rare  capacity  for  accurate  discrimination,  and  of  opportunity 
for  extended  personal  observation, —  tlie  distinguislicd  scientific 
traveller,  Humboldt, — remarked  in  tiie  preface  to  his  "Researches  :" 
"  The  nations  of  America,  except  those  which  border  the  polar 
circle,  form  a  single  race,  characterized  by  tiie  formation  of  the 
skull,  the  color  of  the  skin,  the  extreme  thinness  of  tlie  beard,  and 
the  straight  glossy  hair.'' 

Until  very  recent  years  this  was  accepted  as  no  less  indisput- 
able than  any  axiom  of  Euclid.  American  ethnologists  were 
agreed  as  to  tiie  predominance  of  one  ethnical  ty[)e  througiiout 
the  whole  western  iiemisi)liere ;  while  those  of  Europe,  with  rarer 
opportunities  for  pcrsomU  observation,  wore  predisposed  by  all 
the  narratives  of  early  voyagers  to  accept  the  conclusion  that  the 
man  of  the  New  World  was  a  well-donned  variety,  if  not  a  dis- 
tinct species,  of  the  genus  Homo.     Pricliard,  Lawrence,  Wiseman, 


V 


vi 
ej 

a| 
si 

iJ 
fi 

I 


mT 


*J?fl 


ethnological 


!i,  extreme 
(lifr«  rences 
eiican  coti ■• 
in  the  un- 
iso-relievos 
ry  of  Peru, 
y  of    type 
I'zed  races 
»g"ition  of 
;feat  as  is 
i  Peruvian 
significant 
an  Hindo 
or  the  in- 
to a  con- 
ig  Strait. 

I  ethnical 
•)  that  the 
lite  scien- 
iig  course 
igin  may 
lent  from 
sed  alike 
>ortunity 
scientific 
arches :" 
lie  polar 

II  of  the 
iird,  and 

ndisput- 
s  were 
Jiighout 
tij  rarer 

l>y  all 
liat  the 

a  (lis- 
seman, 


LrJ^t 


Y 


SKCTION   OF    ANTUHOPOI.OGY. 


11 


Knox,  Morton,  Agassiz,  Sqnier,  Gliddon,  Nott,  and  Meigs,  might 
each  be  quoted  in  confirniation  of  this  opinion,  and  especially  of 
the  prevailing  uniformity  of  certain  strongly-marked  cranial  char- 
acteristics. Agassiz,  for  example,  affirmed  in  very  explicit  lan- 
guage :  "  with  the  exception  of  the  Arctic  Esquimaux,  there  is 
only  one  single  race  of  men  extending  over  the  whole  range  of 
North  and  South  America,  but  dividing  into  innumerable  tribes  ; 
whilst,  in  the  Old  World,  there  are  a  great  many  well-defined  and 
easily  distinguished  races,  which  are  circumscribed  within  compar- 
atively much  narrower  boundaries."  Morton,  again,  viewing  the 
subject  in  the  light  of  his  own  special  evidence,  designated  a 
markedly  brachycephalic  skull,  with  flattened  occiput,  recovered 
from  one  of  the  mounds  in  the  Scioto  Valley,  "  an  aboriginal 
American  head,"  and  added :  "  tiiis  is,  perhaps,  the  most  ad- 
mirably formed  head  of  the  American  race  hitherto  discovered. 
It  possesses  the  national  characteristics  in  perfection."  Accord- 
ingly, after  indicating  these  in  detail,  he  afBrms  :  "  it  is  the  perfect 
type  of  Indian  conformation,  to  which  the  skulls  of  all  the  tribes 
from  Cape  Horn  to  Canada  more  or  less  approximate." 

Among  what  may  be  designated  typical  Canadian  skulls,  those 
of  the  llurons  of  the  region  13'ing  around  the  Georgian  Bay  have 
a  si)ecial  value.  They  represent,  as  we  believe,  a  native  race 
which,  under  various  names,  extended  from  the  Lower  St.  Law- 
rence westward  to  Lake  St.  Clair,  the  Ouane-dote :  including  the 
Petuns,  Neuters,  llurons,  Eries,  and  other  Wyandot  tribes,  of  the 
same  stoek  as  the  Iroquois ;  but  to  whose  implacable  enmity  their 
extermination  was  ultimately  due.  The  native  population  first  met 
with  by  Cartier  and  the  French  explorers  of  1535,  is  believed  to 
have  been  of  the  same  Wyandot  stock  ;  but  before  the  return  of 
the  French  under  Chumplain,  in  1G03,  they  had  been  exterminated, 
or  driven  westward  to  the  later  country  of  the  Hurons,  on  the  Geor- 
gian Hay,  There  they  were  first  visited  by  Ciiamplain  in  1G15, 
and  sul)sc(iuently  by  the  French  Jesuit  missionari"s  who,  in  1(539, 
found  them  occupying  thirty-two  palisaded  villages.  Brelxruf 
reckoned  their  number  in  1(135  at  thirty  thousand,  and  they  are 
estimated,  in  the  "Relation"  of  1(5(')0  at  thirty-five  thousand.  Al- 
ready, at  that  early  date,  the  whole  country  westward  from  the 
Ottawa  to  the  Huron  eouulry  around  Lake  Simcoe,  had  been  de- 
popiiluti'd,  and  reduced  to  a  desert,  by  tlie  wrath  of  tlu;  Irotpiois. 
Charlevoix  assigns  the  year  l(!55  as  that  of  the  destruction  of 


!  '■*! 


-"-^smwri 


'5fi: 


!    ^i^ 


12 


AI^DHKSS   BY   UANIKL   WILSON, 


tlie  Attivvendrtronks  or  Np  f 

P«"insula  between  iake  ETe2','Zt""T'  "''  '^''^''^  ^''V^-'a 

;'-e  t,  bad  aheady  been  extern  ^t!,  hi  h''  '"  "'"^^^  ^'-^  ^'-y 
kmclred  race,  before  the  Frenc^ex^  ,o  ''  .  '  "''^'"''  «^  *''«  «-"« 
-■stence  of  the   lalce  whicfbe^ '^^^^^^^^^ 

French  maps  an   imaginary  rive    L      J  "''"'•     ^"  ^''«  ^^''''er 
I^ake  Huron  to  Lake  Ontario  ^''"'^   ""interruptedly  ft-om 

"I^^east  of  the  Dead"  celeb  at^l'"  T'"''  '^^^"«  ^^  ^''^i'"  Wea^ 
^vJ.ea  the  remains  of  tl  et  sc' '' '7^'^^  "^  t«"  or  twelve  ve^ 
-.folded  biers,  or  remotTg^:^  tc  T  ^""  ''''''•^'  ^'^  «>  l' 
•nonua    and  mourning  i„  the  ^e  i:;^^^ '^'^^^  ^-"'  gr-Kl  cere- 
the  vicinity  of  the  sites  of  their  n'n     ,?'"''  ^'  *''^  »'•'»>-•     In 
«"aneshaverepeatecliybee,    found       11  '"'•''^"  «'^^«"«ive  os" 
";  ^'-  "".seum  Of  Lavil  U  ivt  1  U  O     r"  "^  "-^P--ve,  , 
sk-Ils  recovered  fron,  the  IhZT  ^  '^'''  "'"^'•^''•i^  of  ei..htv 

achin    »<f    at         r.  ""'on  cemeteries  of  <<f    r  ^'f^"\Y 

,  '^'-  Mary,  St.  Michael    ami  nH  .     ^^^- Ig"-ice,  St.  Jo- 

«o  designated  by  the  French  ills  L'"'        "''  "'"■«"  ^'"^-es 
-ventoenth   century,  an        bo       ^''^T  ^^""  "'^'^^^^  ^"^""  '-""t^^^' 
^;«"s  there.     Other  examples  1  •      "J''  r"^"''""^"  «^  ^'-  ^n- 
loronto  University;  and  I  nnv     n    ,     ™'   '"   ^''^  '""^eum  of 
-ost  extensive  refe'arches',:  ^  Z^'  ""''■  '^^-'^^'  '^^  whon.  tl  e 
«k"lls  to  the  London  Anthropl:'s:;:'r^'^"^-'  '^-  Huron 
forwarded  specimens  to  Dr  De  (W    /    ''''^' '  «'"'  '  ''^^ve  since 
Janlin  des  riantes  at  Pans        ''^"'^'^''^^'S^^  ^or  the  museum  of  t^ 

A  special  value  attaches  to  the  skull,  . 
on  ossuaries,  f^on.  the  fact  t  utt  t.''''"'^' '"'•«'"  ^"«-"  Hu- 
''•'-«"  out  of  the  country,  by  til i     I.  ""■^  <^^xterminated,  or 

-;eo  the  crania  recovere,V fron    Ui^7r"  "^^'  '"  ''''■'  -n. 
J'^^'l  npon  as  giving  a  fair  ill„,f '  ,  .       ''^""-'^*^^'i''''  n.ay  be  re. 

*-  o^  the  race.     The  2^^^:,'    ^^ /f^-i-'  chaL^    : 

^«es,  rescued    from  the   gene  "'"'*'''  '''^'''' "'"^^•''•onrcfu- 

l;onch  n.issionaries  to  (^.  ,t  "   ""'.•^"'  ^''^    l"-o".'I.t  by  the 


-^wwSlif' 


"rs? 


ciffi^rd  :=sf 


SECTION   OF   ANTHROPOLOGY. 


13 


•tile  Niagara 
\  the  Paries, 
-  shore  they 
of  the  same 
^rtained  the 
tlie  earlier 
'tedly  from 

»ns  in  their 
esuit  Fath- 
*aiis,  from 
lieir  great 
'Ive  years, 
'  fiom  old 
•find  cere- 
libe.     In 
nsive  os- 
I'eserved, 
>f  eighty 
'■1  fit.  Jo- 
villages, 
'11  in  tlie 

tlie  In- 
5euni  of 
loin  tlie 

Huron 
e  since 

of  tlie 

se  Hii- 

ed,  or 

:  and 

he  re- 

:^(eiis- 

I'Ofll- 

y  tlie 

illage 
since 
■rest- 
■  the 


survival  alike  of  native  intellectual  and  physical  traits,  after  an 
interval  of  well  nigh  two  centuries  and  a  half  passed  in  intimate 
intercourse,  and  latterly  frequent  intermarriage  with  the  French 
habitans. 

The  Huron  skull  is  strongly  marked  as  of  the  dolichocephalic  type. 
The  careful  measurements  of  thirty -nine  male  skulls  yield  a  mean 
longitudinal  diameter  of  7.39  to  a  parietal  diameter  of  5.50 ;  and  of 
eighteen  female  skulls,  a  longitudinal  diameter  of  7.07  to  a  parietal 
diameter  of  5.22.  One  essential  characteristic,  therefore,  that  of 
great  relative  length,  is  unmistakable.  I  specially  refer  to  this  now, 
because  we  possess,  in  the  collection  of  the  Canadian  Institute  at 
Toronto,  a  skull  recovered  from  one  of  the  Huron  ossuaries  near 
Lake  Siincoe  which  dift'ers  essentially  from  this  Huron  type.  It  is  a 
short  skull, —  shorter  even  than  that  from  the  Scioto  mound, —  of 
the  same,  so-called,  globular  type,  measuring  only  6.00  in  longi- 
tudinal, and  6.40  in  parietal,  diameter.  Reverting,  therefore,  to 
Dr.  Morton's  ascription  to  the  Scioto  mound  skull  of  national 
characteristics,  which  constitute  it  "the  perfect  type  of  Indian  con- 
formation, to  which  the  skulls  of  all  the  tribes  from  Cape  Horn  to 
Canada  more  or  less  approximate,"  this  northern  example,  if  it 
stood  alone,  would  seem  to  confirm  his  assumption.  But  it  is  a 
wholly  exceptional  case  ;  so  distinct  from  the  true  Huron  type  that, 
after  a  careful  studj'  of  one  hundred  and  twenty-six  crania  from 
ossuaries  of  the  Huron  country,  including  considerable  deviations 
from  what  may  be  regarded  as  the  normal  type,  I  have  not  found 
one  other  example  approximating  to  it.  It  differs  little  less  essen- 
tially from  the  race-form  of  the  people  whose  grave  its  owner  shared 
than  that  of  a  Chinese  from  the  noriuj''  skull  of  the  pure  Anglo- 
American  ;  and  may  be  assumed  as  that  of  an  Indian  belonging  to 
some  far  southern  tribe,  whom  the  chances  of  Indian  warfare  had 
made  a  captive,  or  an  adopted  member,  of  the  Huron  tribe  in  whose 
cemetery  he  found  his  final  resting-place. 

Such  indications  of  physical  diversit}',  among  the  nations  so 
widely  scattered  throughout  the  New  World,  accord  with  philo- 
logical and  other  cvidonco.  Not  bj'  one,  but  by  diverse  routes 
have  the  fathers  of  the  American  nations  found  their  way  thither : 
some  by  liehring  Strait  and  the  Aleutian  Islands ;  others  by  more 
southern  routes  across  the  broad  Pacific,  aided  by  winds  and  cur- 
rents, and  passing  onwjird  from  islniid  to  island  of  the  great 
archipelago  ;  others,  us  we  know,  i)y  Iceland  and  Greenland,  across 


I 
1  ) 


"^mmm* 


■»%-* 


w^^ 


'^mm^mmEmmX\ 


111 

Ml 


14 


AUDUESS  BY    UANiKL    WILSON, 


the  northern  Atlantic;  and  others  again  —  as  philological  evi- 
dence seems  to  indicate, —  along  the  same  route  as  that  which  Co- 
lumbus successfully  pursued  in  1492.  But  to  the  primary  migra- 
tions we  know  not  how  remote  a  date  to  assign,  in  order  to  allow 
of  the  i^terblending  of  intruding  races,  and  the  development  of 
the  native  American  "Red  Man"  with  all  his  distinctive  traits 
of  individuality.  For,  while  it  is  important  to  note  the  elements  of 
diversity,  it  is  nevertheless  true  that  the  New  World  does  differ 
from  tlie  Old  in  the  narrow  range  of  such  variations  of  race-type 
through  all  extremes  of  climate  from  arctic  to  temperate,  tropi- 
cal, and  antarctic.  The  European  traveller  who  surveys  his  own 
continent  from  the  northern  habitat  of  the  Fins  and  Lapps,  and 
the  corresponding  Asiatic  hyperboreans,  and  then  traverses  the 
eastern  hemisphere  to  the  Cape  or  to  the  Indian  Ocean,  comes  in 
contact  with  all  intermedir.ee  varieties  between  the  two  extremes 
of  tlie  white  and  black  races ;  and  recognizes  in  western  Europe 
the  Melanocroi  who  seem  to  be  the  resultant  of  their  inter-blendins; 
in  prehistoric  times.  But  in  America  we  seem  to  see  no  more 
than  a  result  analogous  to  tiie  latter  ;  and  this  as  the  product  of 
more  nearly  allied  primitive  stocks,  the  largely  preponderating 
element  of  which  has  been  derived  from  the  Mongol  uea  of  east- 
ern Asia.  Piiilological  evidence,  on  the  other  hand,  no  less  clearly 
indicates  the  remoteness  of  the  migrations  by  which  this  first  colo- 
nization of  the  New  World  was  effected  ;  it  may  be,  indeed,  that 
they  pertain  to  periods  when  the  physical  geography  of  both  con- 
tinents, and  of  the  intermediate  archipelago,  afforded  facilities  for 
migration  altogether  wanting  with!,   historic  times. 

But  such  ideas  of  a  derivative  origin  of  the  American  aborigines 
are  of  very  modern  growth,  and  are  only  now  displacing  long  ac- 
credited beliefs.  That  the  man  of  this  New  World  must  prove  a 
being  essentially  different  from  any  knov.'u  race  of  Europe,  Africa, 
or  Asia,  was  an  opinion  which  assumed  ever  stronger  confirmation, 
as  the  idea  of  Columbus  that  he  had  landed  on  the  eastern  Con- 
tinent faded  away  from  the  minds  of  his  successors.  The  Indians 
of  his  new-found  world  were  no  natives  of  Cipango,  or  the  valley 
of  the  Indus;  and  the  literature  of  the  fifteenth  and  sixteenth  cen- 
turies abounds  with  evidence  that  it  was  nnich  easier  to  persuade 
the  men  of  that  age  that  Calibans  and  monstrous  Anthropophagi 
peopled  the  sti'aiige  regions  beyond  the  Allaiitic,  than  that  these 
were   inhabited  by  human  beings  like  themselves. 


.  tiii^ipw*'  r 


Urjm 


ray  fori 


ii^k 


SECTION    OF    ANTHROPOLOGY. 


15 


Even  Columbus,  it  has  to  be  remembered,  in  searching  for  evi- 
dence to  confirm  his  own  scientific  demonstration  tliat  tlie  world 
was  a  spliere,  and  so,  tliat  the  eastern  continent  could  be  readied 
by  a  western  route,  attached  special  value  to  indications  of  the  ex- 
istence of  a  transatlantic  continent,  derived  from  the  fact  that  the 
bodie:*  of  two  dead  men  had  been  cast  ashore  on  the  island  of  Flores, 
differing  essentially  in  features  and  physical  characteristics  from 
any  known  race.  When,  at  length,  the  great  discoverer  set  foot  on 
the  islands  first  visited  bj'  him,  the  peculiarities  which  marked  the 
gentle  and  friendly  race  of  Guanahani;  were  noted  with  curious 
minuteness  ;  and  their  ''tawny  or  copper  hue,"  their  straight,  coarse, 
black  hair,  strange  features,  and  well-developed  forms,  were  all 
recorded  as  objects  of  interest.  On  his  return,  the  little  caravel 
of  Columbus  was  freighted  not  only  with  gold  and  other  coveted 
products  of  the  New  World,  but  with  nine  of  its  natives,  brought 
from  the  Islands  of  San  Salvador  and  Hispaniola,  eight  of  whom 
survived  to  gaze  on  the  strange  civilization  of  Spain,  and  to  be 
themselves  objects  of  scarcely  less  astonishment  than  if  they  had 
come  from  another  planet.  Such  was  the  earliest  knowledge  ac- 
quired by  the  Old  World  of  the  type  of  humanity  generically  de- 
signated as  the  Red  Indian  ;  and  the  attention  which  its  peculiarities 
excited  when  thus  displayed  in  their  fresh  novelty  has  not  yet 
exhausted  itself,  after  an  interval  now  lit'i\e  short  of  four  centuries. 

Of  all  known  races  of  the  New  World,  the  Eskimo  alone  pre- 
sented, at  first,  a  seemingly  marked  diversity  from  the  other  aborig- 
ines ;  though  the  grounds  on  which  such  a  conclusion  was  based  arc 
traceable  far  more  to  Arctic  conditions  of  life,  than  to  auy  eth- 
nical peculiarities  definitely  assigned  to  them. 

This  is  api)arent  from  the  terms  employed  by  the  historian 
Robertson, who,  writing  in  1777,  says:  "Tiie  Esquimaux  are  man- 
ifestly a  race  of  men  distinct  from  all  the  nations  of  the  American 
continent,  in  language,  in  disposition,  and  in  habits  of  life.  But 
among  all  the  other  inl'.abitants  of  America  there  is  such  a  striking 
similitude  in  the  form  of  their  bodies,  and  the  qualities  of  their 
minds,  that,  notwithstanding  the  diversities  occasioned  by  the  in- 
fluence of  clima.o,  or  unequal  progress  of  improvement,  we  must 
pronounce  them  to  be  desceii<led  from  one  source." 

Tlie  idea  thus  deliiiiioly  sot  forth  l)y  the  Scottisli  historian  oftlio 
last  cuntury  was  placed  on  what  seoiiu'd  to  lie  a  strictly  scicnlidc  ba- 
sis by  the  author  of  the  "Crania  Americana."      Dr.  Morton's  dili- 


(^ 


*^««^"r!!SI 


1(,U      '•ir"ii"i'* 


■«:■: 


^m^   mm, 


llJ 


16 


ADDRESS    BY    DANIEL  WILSON, 


gencc  in  the  accnmnlation  of  evidence  merits  our  highest  gratitude. 
But  he  had  unfortuiritely  set  out  with  the  idea  of  one  nearly  uni- 
form race  peculiar  to  the  New  World  ;  and  with  all  the  evidence 
before  him  which  has  since  sufllced  to  convince  others  of  the  prev- 
alence of  great  diversity  of  head-forms  among  American  races,  he 
persisted  to  the  close  in  maintaining  the  physical  unity  of  the  Red 
Race  from  the  arctic  circle  to  Cape  Horn. 

Of  the  three  propositions  with  which  Dr.  Morton  sums  up  the 
results  borne  out,  as  he  conceives,  by  all  the  evidence  advanced  in 
his  "Crania  Americana,"  one  is,  "That  the  American  nations,  ex- 
cepting the  polar  tribes,  are  of  one  race  and  one  species,  but  of  two 
great  families,  which  resemble  each  other  in  physical,  but  differ  in 
intellectual  character."  Any  difficulty  arising  from  physical  or 
other  differences,  he  sought  to  overcome  by  the  application  of  the 
hypothesis  that  "these  races  originated  in  nations,  and  not  in  a 
single  pair ;  thus  forming  proximate  but  not  identical  species." 
Subsequent  to  his  death  his  collection  of  crania  was  acquired  by  the 
Academy  of  Natural  Sciences  of  Philadelphia,  and  thereafter  sup- 
plemented in  its  most  important  branches  by  many  valuable  ad- 
ditions. This  greatly  augmented  collection  was  classified  anew  and 
catalogued  by  the  late  Dr.  J.  Aitken  Meigs  ;  and  after  having  thus 
had  all  the  evidence  which  it  presents  brought  in  systematic  order 
under  his  own  notice,  he  contributed  to  Gliddon's  "Indigenous 
Races  of  Men,"  a  paper  entitled  "Cranial  characteristics  of  the 
Races  of  Men,"  in  which  he  thus  reiterated  the  Mortoniau  dogma: 
"Tl  rough  Crania  Americana,  it  has  long  been  known  to  the  scicn- 
tifu  world  that  a  remarkable  sameness  of  osteological  character 
pt"  vades  all  the  American  tribes  from  Hudson's  Bay  to  Terra  del 
Tuego.  It  is  c(iually  well  known  that  the  researches  of  Humboldt 
and  Gallatin  have  demonstrated  a  conformity  not  less  remarkable 
in  the  language  and  artistic  tendencies  of  these  numerous  and 
widely-scattered  aborigines." 

The  artificial  transformations  of  the  Indian  head  were  at  first  a 
source  of  difficulty  in  any  systematic  classification  of  head-forms ; 
and  the  views  of  Dr.  Morton  underwent  considerable  modification 
on  some  points  relating  to  the  influence  of  this  custom  in  perpet- 
uating certain  types  of  head  ;  but  he  finally  reverted  to  the  origi- 
nal idea  of  one  predominant  cranial  type  to  which  all  the  races  of 
the  American  continent  more  or  less  nearly  approximated. 

The  evidence  which  the  mediiuval  European  examples  of  cranial 


ml 
oil 

th 
cii 

p1 

inl 


cil 


B1I 


HI 
sll 


lUIPW"**' " 


f**H 


forjM 


'ii':i^^iMt' 


mMk. 


SECTION    OK    ANTUKOl'OLOOY. 


17 


t  gi'.iti  tilde, 
iifarly  II Mi- 
le evidence 
f  the  {)i-ev- 
n  races,  he 
of  the  Red 

>nis  up  the 
ivaiiced  in 
ations,  ex- 
but  of  two 
t  differ  in 
lysical  or 
ion  of  tiie 
not  in  a 
species." 
ed  by  the 
ifter  siip- 
luble  ad- 
mew  and 
'ing  thus 
tic  order 
iigenoiis 
s  of  the 
dogma  : 
le  scien- 
liai-acter 
erra  del 
iinbohlt 
Jvrkabie 
311  s  and 

;  first  a 
forms ; 
ication 
^erpet- 
origi- 
ices  of 

nuiial 


deformation  supply  suggests  the  origin  of  this  barbarous  practice 
in  an  aim  at  conformity  with  the  natural  head-form  of  a  patrician 
or  conquering  race.  Dr.  Fitzinger,  who  has  caiefuUy  investigated 
the  whole  subject  of  the  discovery  of  macrocephalic  skulls  in  an- 
cient Austrian  sepulchral  deposits,  after  tracing  the  evidence  sup- 
plied by  the  allusions  of  classic  writers,  mentions  an  interesting 
independent  illustration  of  the  subject.  A  medal,  struck  appar- 
ently to  commemorate  the  destruction  of  the  town  of  Aquileia,  by 
Attila  the  Hun,  in  the  year  452,  came  under  his  notice.  On  one 
side  is  represented  the  ruined  city,  and  on  the  other  the  bust  of  the 
Hunish  leader  in  profile,  with  thv  sunn  form  of  head  as  that 
shown  in  the  supposed  Avar  skulls  found  in  the  valley  of  the  Dan- 
ube. One  of  this  type  obtained  by  M.  Hippolyte  Gosse,  from  an 
ancient  cemetery  in  Savoy,  presents  the  favorite  Hun  or  Avar  form 
when  viewed  in  profile,  with  the  singular  vertical  elongation  wiiich 
appears  to  have  constituted  an  ideal  type  of  masculine  beauty 
among  the  Asiatic  followers  of  Attila,  as  among  the  Natchez,  the 
Peruvians,  and  other  nations  of  thj  New  World.  It  was  found  at 
Villy,  near  lleigner,  and  has  been  engraved  by  lletzius,  from  a 
drawing  furnished  to  him  by  the  discoverer. 

Thierry,  in  his  "Attila,"  refers  to  the  artificial  means  resorted  to 
by  his  followers  in  order  to  give  a  Mongolian  physiognomy  to  their 
children.  The  Hunish  leader  welcomed  every  able  bodied  recruit 
to  his  standard,  and  was  in  reality  as  much  a  leader  of  Goths  as 
of  Huns  ;  though  the  black  Huns  from  the  dreary  Siberian  steppes 
constituted  the  aristocracy'  of  his  wild  followers,  whose  Mongolian 
physiognomy  formed  the  ideal  of  ethnic  beauty.  At  this  the 
Gothic  mother  accordingly  aimed,  by  bandaging  the  nose,  com- 
pressing the  cheek  bones,  and  giving  an  artificial  form  to  the 
cranium  of  her  infant.  Such  practices,  however,  when  once 
brought  into  general  use,  continue  long  after  the  reason  for  their 
adoption  has  ceased.  It  need  not  therefore  greatly  surprise  us  to 
learn  that  the  practice  of  distorting  the  skull  in  infancy  still 
prevails  in  some  districts  of  France.  Among  the  examples  of  such 
cranial  malformation  engraved  bj-  Dr.  Foville,  in  his  work  on  the 
"Anatomy  of  the  Nervous  System,"  there  is  one  wliich  might  take 
its  place  alongside  of  some  of  the  most  exaggerated  specimens 
brougl\t  from  Peruvian  cemeteries. 

IJiit  hdui'ver  Mie  (iothicr  inotlier  migiit  labor  to  make  the  natural 
develoi)meut  of  her  infant's  iicad  conform  to  the  Mongolian  nioilel, 


-ii-^awBTTrtl 


18 


ADDRESS    BY    DANIEL    WILSON, 


tlic  traces  of  the  originally  dolichocephalic  type  could  not  be  wholly 
eradicatetl.  This  is  seen  on  comparing  examples  in  any  large 
collection  of  American  Indian  skulls.  ^  '  ->  compressed  and 
distorted  Peruvian  crania,  traces  of  tw  ,ct  types  appear  to 

me  still  uneradicated.  The  same  is  noticeable  in  the  sculptures  of 
Central  America,  as  in  the  Palenque  bas-reliefs  where  deities  and 
cliiefs  treading  kneeling  figures  underfoot,  present  the  long,  sloping 
forehead  in  a  line  with  the  straight  nose,  with  other  features  of 
the  strange  profile  peculiar  to  the  old  race ;  while  the  subject  race 
is  hook-nosed,  with  high  foreheads,  and  heads  seeminglj'  uncom- 
pressed. If  the  idea  is  well-founded,  which  thus  traces  the  origin 
of  this  barbarous  practice  to  the  etforts  of  an  inferior,  or  subject 
race  to  approximate  in  outward  appearance  to  the  privileged  class, 
its  very  occurrence  points  to  the  existence  at  some  previous  time 
of  races  essentially  diverse  in  physical  character.  And  if  we  as- 
sume their  relative  positions  to  have  been  akin  to  that  of  tiie  con- 
quering Hun  and  tlie  enslaved  Frank  or  German,  the  motive  to  such 
a  practice  is  suinciently  obvious.  Were  it  possible  for  the  colored 
population  of  Canada  and  the  United  States,  at  the  present  day,  by 
any  analogous  process  to  assimilate  their  offspring  to  the  Anglo- 
Saxon  type,  how  irresistible  would  the  motive  be  to  its  use. 

Such  ideas,  however,  found  no  favor  with  the  author  of  the  "Cra- 
nia Americana ;"  and  in  some  of  tlie  conclusions  finally  adopted 
by  him  he  has  been  sustained  by  authorities  of  just  weight  in  sci- 
ence. In  the  latest  record  of  his  matured  views,  as  set  forth  in  a 
posthumous  paper  contributed  to  Schoolcraft's  "History  of  the  In- 
dian Tribes,"  he  remarks  :  "I  at  first  found  it  dillicult  to  conceive 
that  the  original  rounded  skull  of  the  Indian  could  be  changed 
into  this  fantastic  form ;  and  was  led  to  suppose  that  the  latter 
was  an  artificial  elongation  of  a  head  remarkable  for  its  length  and 
narrowness.  1  even  supposed  that  the  long-headed  Peruvians 
were  a  more  ancient  people  than  tlie  Inca  tribes,  and  distinguished 
from  them  by  their  cranial  configuration.  In  this  opinion  I  was 
mistaken.  Abundant  means  of  observation  and  comparison  have 
since  convinced  me  that  all  these  variously  formed  heads  were 
originally  of  the  same  rounded  shape." 

In  that  same  final  contribution  to  his  favorite  science,  Dr.  Mor- 
ton's matured  views  on  the  whole  subject  of  tiie  cranial  type  of 
the  American  continent — based  on  tlu?  acMitional  evidence  accu- 
mulated by  him,  in    the  interval  of  twelve   years  which    elapsed 


bel 

ar 

fol 

an| 

be 


j.WjMW^-Wi'lTliWailiSlI'' 


r<»,Y 


UrJM^ 


SECTION    or   ANTIIROrOLOGY. 


19 


between  tlio  publication  of  the  "Crania  Americana"  and  his  death, — 
are  tims  (lefiiicd  :  "The  Indian  skull  is  of  a  decidedly  rounded 
form.  The  occipital  portion  is  flattened  in  the  upward  direction, 
and  the  transverse  diameter,  as  measured  between  the  parietal 
bones,  is  remarkably  wide,  an<l  often  exceeds  the  longitudinal  line." 

It  is  curious  to  observe  in  this  latter  statement  the  evidence  of 
a  careful  and  most  conscientious  observer  allowing  all  the  proofs 
of  varying  physical  type  which  his  own  indefatigable  industrj'  had 
accumulated,  to  be  subordinated  to  this  foregone  conclusion.  Here 
Dr.  Morton  must  have  had  in  view  his  theoretical  type,  rather  than 
the  results  of  his  own  careful  observations,  for  even  if  he  accepted 
as  evidence  the  artificially  abbreviated  and  flattened  skulls,  his 
"Crania  Americana"  furnishes  only  one  exceptional  example,  from 
a  mound  on  the  Alabama  river  (I'l.  LIV),  of  which  he  says: 
"  It  is  flattened  on  the  occiput  and  os  frontis  in  such  a  manner  as 
to  give  the  whole  head  a  sugar-loaf  or  conical  form,  whence  also 
its  great  lateral  diameter  and  its  narrowness  from  back  to  front." 
Tlie  idea  had,  in  fact,  received  nearly  universal  acceptance  that 
the  European  immigrants  of  the  fifteenth  and  subsequent  centuries 
intruded  upon  races  of  wholly  distinct  origin  from  themselves,  and 
were  displacing  the  true  American  autocthones,  with  whom  they 
had  nothing  in  common. 

When  Prior  Fernando  de  Talavera  of  Salamanca  summoned  a 
meeting  in  the  Convent  of  San  Esteban,  in  the  year  1487,  to  take 
into  consideration  the  proimsition  of  Columbus  that  the  earth  was 
not  a  plane,  but  a  sphere  ;  and  that,  b}'  sailing  in  a  western  course, 
land,  which  he  assumed  must  be  the  most  eastern  coast  of  Asia, 
would  be  reached  :  the  assembled  philosophers  and  theologians 
gravely  pronounced  tiie  idea  of  the  earth's  spherical  form  hetero- 
dox, and  a  belief  in  antipodes  incompatible  with  the  historical 
traditions  of  our  faith  ;  since  to  assert  that  there  were  inhal)ited 
lands  on  the  opposite  side  of  the  globe,  would  be  to  maintain  that 
there  were  nations  not  descended  from  Adam,  it  being  impossible 
for  them  to  have  passed  tiie  intervening  ocean  ! 

We  smile  at  the  orthodox  philosophers  and  theologians  of  the 
fifteenth  century,  who,  with  the  heli)  of  St.  .lerome  and  St.  Aug- 
ustine, proved  this  western  hemisphere  of  ours  to  be  an  imi)ossi- 
bility  ;  ycl  it  is  curious  to  detect  the  same  old  prejudices  uncon- 
sciously influencing  the  minds  of  some  of  the  acutest  men  of 
science  in  very  recent  years.     What  else  was  it,  if  not  this  "  im- 


I 


^^    js^Mj^^l^ 


IS?"*'*" 


.  i^T^  'V'. 


l^^trnmnMnnv 


fit- 


•T^iriyi''v"'"fu_ 


20 


ADDUESS    nv    DANIEL    WILSON, 


possibility  for  them  to  have  passed  the  intervening  ocean,"  or  in 
other  words,  to  liave  sprung  Iroin  llie  siinie  stock,  which  led  one 
of  our  own  most  valued  associates,  the  late  Professor  Agassi/  — 
a  scientific  observer  of  rare  sagacity  and  experience,  and  one  who 
regarded  the  entire  question  of  American  ethnology  from  a  point 
of  view  peculiarly  his  ov/n, — to  adopt  the  conclusions  of  Dr.  Mor- 
ton, in  spite  of  the  palpable  inconsistency  of  the  evidei;ce  which  he 
was  so  well  qualified  1,o  estimate  at  its  true  worth  ?  In  his  "Sketch 
of  the  Natural  Provinces  of  the  Animal  World,  and  their  relation 
to  the  ditferent  Types  of  Man,''  while  appealing  to  the  results  ar- 
rived at  by  Dr.  Moiton,  in  reference  to  the  imagined  unity  of  tiie 
whole  American  aborigines  as  "a  single  race,"  he  realHrms  the 
homogeneous  characteristics  and  ethnic  insulation  of  the  American 
Indian  on  entirely  novel  grounds.  After  defining  the  evidence  on 
which  his  general  conclusion  is  based,  that  the  boundaries  within 
which  the  different  natural  comi)inations  of  animals  are  circum- 
scribed on  the  surface  of  the  earth  coincide  with  the  natural  range 
of  distinct  types  of  man,  he  proceeds  to  show  that  America,  in- 
cluding both  its  northern  and  southern  continent,  differs  essentially 
from  Europe  and  Asia,  or  Africa,  in  being  characterized  throughout 
by  a  much  greater  uniformity  in  all  its  natural  productions,  than 
comparison  enables  us  to  trace  in  the^Old  World.  He  then  adds : 
"With  these  .  tCts  before  us,  we  may  expect  that  there  should  be  no 
great  diversity  among  the  tribes  of  man  inhabiting  this  continent ; 
and  indeed  the  most  extensive  investigation  of  their  peculiarities 
has  led  Dr.  Morton  to  consider  them  as  constituting  but  a  single 
race,  from  the  confines  of  the  Esquimaux  down  to  the  southernmost 
extremity  of  the  continent.  But,  at  the  same  time,  it  should  be  re- 
membered that,  in  accordance  with  the  zoological  character  of  the 
whole  realm,  this  race  is  divided  into  an  infinite  number  of  small 
tribes,  presenting  more  or  less  difference  one  from  another." 

It  is  interesting  thus  to  recall  the  matured  opinions  of  this  leader 
of  scientific  thought  among  ourselves  in  very  recent  years,  and 
review  them  now  in  the  light  of  the  great  revolution  since  wrought 
in  the  entire  compass  of  ethnical  and  biological  science.  The 
author  of  the  "Indigenous  Races  of  Men"  scornfully  assailed  "the 
Monogonists'  idea"  of  a  unity  of  race,  and  sununed  »ip  the  prac- 
tical results  which  to  iiim  ai)peared  to  bo  settled  beyond  farther 
cavil,  with  this  fancied  (lemonstration  :  "It  has  boon  sliown,  1st, 
tiiut  in  America,  humatile  men  and  humalile  monke3s  occupy  the 


m;W»n«w"H)|apsi 


f'H 


Urjm^ 


ing  ocean,"  or  in 
•k,  which  led  one 
lessor  Agassi/  — 
»ce,  and  one  who 
3gy  from  a  point 
ions  of  Dr.  Mor- 
videi.'oe  which  he 

In  his  "Siietch 
nd  tlieir  relation 
o  the  results  ar- 
'led  unity  of  the 
le  realHrms  the 
)f  the  American 
the  evidence  on 
lundaries  within 
als  are  circuni- 
c  natural  range 
at  America,  in- 
fers essentially 
ized  throughout 
xluctions,  than 
He  then  adds  : 
e  should  he  no 
liis  continent ; 
I'  peculiarities 
£,'  but  a  sinsrle 
'  southernmost 
t  should  be  re- 

acter  of  the 
of  small 
lotiier," 

of  this  leader 
It  years,  and 

iuce  wrought 

cience.     The 
assailed  "the 

lip  the  prac- 
yond  farther 

shown,  1st, 
s  occupy  tlie 


inber 


[■■"Tiai 


SECTION    OF    ANTHROrOLOr.Y. 


21 


same  paljpontological  zones.  2nd,  That  whilst  all  such  remains 
of  man  are  exclusively  of  the  American  Indian  type,  the  monkeys 
called  llapale,  Cebus,  CulUthrix,  etc.,  are  equally  'terrm  geniti'  of 
this  continent.  .  .  Finally,  that  jpermcmeMce  o/ (.?//)e,  as  well  for 
humanity  as  for  simiadre,  is  firmly  established  in  both  genera,  from 
the  hour  in  which  we  are  living,  back  to  a  vastly  remote,  if  not  in- 
calculable, era  of  unrecorded  time."  To  the  evolutionist  of  our 
own  da}-,  the  very  result  of  such  reasoning  is  to  lead  to  ideas  of 
unity  of  origin  vastly  more  comprehensive  than  that  which,  within 
a  period  so  very  recent,  was  thus  rejected  as  wholly  incompatible 
with  deductions  from  much  industriously  accumulated  evidence. 

It  is  curious,  indeed,  to  endeavor  now  to  realize  to  ourselves 
what  distinct  idea  was  present  in  the  mind  of  Agassiz  when  he  ap- 
portioned his  essentially  diverse  types  of  man  to  their  specific 
"natural  provinces;"  or  what  Dr.  Morton  conceived  in  his  own 
mind  when,  after  affirming  one  of  the  three  propositions  which 
he  believed  himself  to  have  established,  to  be  "that  the  American 
nations,  excepting  the  polar  tribes,  are  of  one  race  and  one  species, 
but  of  two  great  families,  which  resemble  each  other  in  physical, 
but  differ  in  intellectual  character:"  he  fancied  that  any  difficulty, 
arising  from  such  physical  diversities  as  it  was  impossible  for 
even  him  entirely  to  ignore,  could  be  removed  by  advancing  the 
hypothesis,  that  "  these  races  originated  in  yiations,  and  not  in  a 
single  pair ;  thus  forming  proximate  but  not  identical  species." 
The  only  thing  which  is  at  all  clear  is  the  assumption  of  what  may 
be  called  a  gregarious  creation  :  the  summoning  into  existence,  by 
some  unknown  process,  or  creative  fiat,  of  an  entire  race,  or  nation, 
at  the  first  peopling  of  this  New  World  with  its  own  specific  abo- 
rigines, "essentially  different  from  the  rest  of  mankind." 

But  Make  Brun  and  Robertson,  Humboldt,  Morton,  Meigs, 
Gliddon  and  Agassiz,  all  concur  in  excepting  the  polar  tribes,  or 
P^skimo,  from  the  assumed  American  race  peculiar  to  this  conti- 
nent. Latham  says  of  the  Eskimo :  "physically  he  is  a  Mongol 
and  Asiatic ;  philologically  he  is  American,  at  least  in  respect 
to  the  princii)les  upon  which  his  speech  is  constructed."  But 
whenccsoever  we  ma}'  derive  them,  they  too  are  ancient  and  widely 
scattered  occupants  of  the  strange  inhospitable  region  appropriated 
to  themselves.  One  branch  of  them,  the  Labrador  Eskimo,  borders 
on  our  own  Eastern  settlements  on  the  SI.  Lawrence  :  beyond  these 
are  the  East  and  the  West  Greenlanders,  including  the  natives  of 


*1fe-..^» 


x^- 


sSfif^-i 


-.'Ouii.  '...^.  wVlbn 


^.        „.,„,-,«»;BSill:1^*l 


22 


ADDRESS    BY    DANIRI.   WILSON, 


the  Danish  trading  settlements?.  To  the  north  of  them  are  the 
Eskimo  oC  the  west  coast,  nortli  of  Melville  IJaj',  styled,  l>y  Sir 
.lolin  Ross,  the  '"Arctic  Highlanders."  liut  their  extreme  northern 
limits  have  yet  to  be  determined.  The  most  advanced  arctic  ex- 
plorers have  either  come  in  contact  with  the  natives,  or  found 
traces  of  their  habitation  ;  and  their  habits  and  indifference  to  the 
extrcmest  rigor  of  the  climate,  justify  the  assumption  that  only  the 
absence  of  game  will  restrict  the  limits  of  their  habitat.  They  oc- 
cupy the  whole  coast  regions  of  Behring  Strait ;  and  extend  beyond 
that  to  the  islands  and  neighboring  continent,  westward  even  to 
the  shores  of  northeastern  Siberia.  The  collection  formed  by  Pro- 
fessor Nordenskeold  in  his  Vega  expedition  —  part  of  which  was 
exhibited  at  Edinburgh  during  the  present  year, —  includes  an  in- 
teresting series  of  implements  used  by  the  Chukches  of  Sil)eria 
and  the  Asiatic  Eskimo  in  fishing  and  hunting.  They  employ  the 
same  kind  of  harpoon  for  hunting  the  walrus;  use  a  long  spear  of 
nearly  the  same  fashion,  generally  furnished  now  with  an  iron 
head,  for  hunting  the  bear ;  while  their  arrows  are  still  pointed 
with  walrus  ivory.  Such  traces  alike  of  connnunity  of  arts  and  of 
race,  within  the  arctic  circle  of  the  Asiatic  and  American  conti- 
nents, and  even  extending  to  Europe,  show  that,  whatever  may 
liave  been  the  ancient  lines  of  migration,  tiie  oversow  in  later 
centuries  across  Behring  Strait  has  been  from  the  American  con- 
tinent westward  into  the  Old  World. 

This  widely  scattered  race,  though  corresponding  in  ethnical 
character,  is  broken  up,  by  the  exigencies  of  their  rigorous  climate 
into  small  tribes  and  isolated  bands,  dispersed  for  the  most  part 
over  a  coast  line  extending  from  Labrador  to  Behring  Strait  up- 
ward of  5,000  miles,  and  migrating  with  the  animals  on  which 
they  depend  for  subsistence.  Thej'  are  hunters  and  fishers.  The 
deer,  the  polar  bear,  the  wild  goose,  swan,  and  other  birds  that 
resort  to  arctic  breeding  grounds,  are  alike  objects  of  the  chase  ; 
but  they  i)rimarily  depend  on  seals  and  cetaceous  animals,  the 
l)iul)l)cr  of  which  furnishes  food  calculated  to  beget  the  animal 
heat  which  enables  them  to  brave  the  severity  of  an  arctic  cli- 
mate. Eskimnntzik  appears  to  be  an  Abenaki  term  signifying 
"•  eaters  of  raw  flesh ;"  and  as  sucii  indicates  the  smprise  with 
wiiicli  even  the  Indian  nomailsof  New  England  viewed  tiie  striinge 
liuliits  of  tlio  liyperltorciui  hunters  witii  wiiom  tlii'y  were  occsLsion- 
allv  l)rought  into  contact.     The  Kskinui,  iiowever,  is  neither  ignor- 


^af/fort/  ^0mM¥^^^  &^mm^^m 


■iitM:Jti':^.Lj^ 


the 


A 


SECTION    OF    ANTIIKOPOLOGY. 


23 


ant  of  tlie  use  of  fire,  so  indispensable  to  him  in  his  rigorons  climate  ; 
nor  is  he  an  exception  to  the  lilting  delinition  of  man  as  "  the 
Cooking  Animal ;"  though  in  his  peculiar  condition  of  exposure  to 
an  arctic  winter,  raw  blubber  is  at  once  a  necessity  and  a  luxury. 

In  one  respect,  as  already  indicated,  the  Eskimo  occupy  a 
peculiar  position  on  this  continent.  They  are  the  only  race  com- 
mon to  the  Old  and  the  New  World  ;  and,  if  we  accept  the  con- 
clusion arrived  at  by  the  author  of  "  Early  Man  in  Britain,"  they 
constituted  an  Old  World  race  to  all  appearance  before  this  New 
World  had  come  into  existence.  The  cave  r.en  of  Europe's  pahw- 
olithic  era,  the  contemporaries  of  the  mammoth,  and  other  long- 
extinct  mammals  of  central  Europe,  have  naturally  excited  an  un- 
wonted interest,  as  their  arts  and  their  remains  have  been  brought 
to  light  in  recent  years.  A  people  of  lowest  type,  as  illustrated  by 
the  famous  Neanderthal  skull,  that  of  the  Forbes  quarr}"^  near  Gil)- 
raltar,  and  of  the  Gourdon  grotto,  with  some  imperfect  traces  of 
others,  all  classed  under  the  connnon  term  of  ''  The  Canstadt 
race,"  is  now  assumed  to  represent  the  earliest,  if  not  indeed  the 
prinueval  man  of  ancient  Europe.  80  far  as  rudest  Hint  imple- 
ments atford  any  evidence  of  his  condition,  we  might  class  him 
with  the  IJosjesman,  the  Australian,  or  the  Patagonian  of  our  own 
day.  The  evidence,  however,  in  proof  of  the  existence  of  this 
Canstadt  savage  race  of  paliuolithic  Europe,  rests  as  yet  on  insuf- 
ficient grounds.  Curiously,  indeed,  Professor  De  Quatrefagos  hiis 
drawn  attention  to  the  fact  that  not  only  are  heads  of  the  Neander- 
thal type  to  be  met  with  in  modern  Europe,  in  some  examples  per- 
taining to  men  of  exceptional  intelligence  ;  but  the  skull  of  Saint 
Mansuy,  Bishop  of  Toul,  of  the  fourtli  century,  surpasses  the 
Neanderthal  cranium  in  some  of  its  most  simian  featiu'ea  ;  and  thnt 
of  the  sagacious  and  politic  hero  of  Scottish  independence,  Uobert 
the  Bruce,  "  is  a  reproduction  of  the  Canstadt  type." 

But  however  uncertain  our  conclusions  may  as  yet  l)e  relative 
to  this  assumed  prinueval  European  type,  there  is  no  douitt  as  lo 
the  Cro-niagnon  race  of  the  reindeer  period  of  southern  France. 
Examples  have,  iniU'cd,  by  no  means  been  confined  to  Hint  area. 
The  Eiigliis  skull  was  found,  with  other  hiimaii  reiiiaius,  enibedtled 
in  a  breccia  along  with  teeth  of  the  fossil  niaminoth,  rhinoceros, 
horse,  and  reindeer,  in  a  cavern  on  the  left  bank  of  the  IMeuse ; 
and  the  Rlciit.one  ('Jivc,  to  the  south  of  the  Al|is,  disclosed  an  1111- 
diiiturlied    sepulchre    of  the    siime   ancient    hunter    race.       Ihit  a 


S^iaiiicSSsr: 


24 


AUUIiESS    HY    DANIEL   WILSON, 


special  interest  attaclies  to  the  remains  brought  to  light  in  1858,  in 
the  rock  shelter  of  Cro-magnon,  in  the  valley  of  the  Vesere.  Tiuee 
men,  a  woman  and  a  child,  had  all  been  buried  in  the  cave.  From 
their  remains  it  is  seen  that  the  race  was  unusually  tall,  and  bore 
equally  little  resemblance  to  the  Neanderthal  or  "  Canstadt" 
type,  or  to  the  modern  Eskimo.  The  best  preserved  skulls — 
tiiose  of  an  old  man  and  a  woman, — are  finely  proportioned,  with 
large,  high  foreheads,  and  great  cerebral  capacity.  M.  Broca 
stated  that  of  the  man  to  be  fully  1590  (lubic  centimetres,  or  96.99 
cubic  inches  ;  and  Dr.  Pruner-Bey  says  of  two  of  the  male  skulls 
and  that  of  the  female,  they  "  have  a  cranial  capacity  much 
superior  to  the  average  of  the  present  day."  It  may  remind  us 
of  Mr.  Alfred  Russel  Wallace's  remark  that  "  natural  selection 
could  only  have  endowed  savage  man  with  a  brain  a  little  supe- 
rior to  that  of  an  ape,  whereas  he  actually  possesses  one  very 
little  inferior  to  that  of  a  philosoplier." 

Wiiatever  differences  of  opinion  affect  the  determination  of  the 
probable  age  of  the  Cro-magnon  race,  tliey  unquestionably  pertain 
to  a  period  so  remote  that  tlie  very  earliest  historical  traces  of  man 
in  soutliern  France  scarcely  seem  to  bring  us  any  nearer  to  the 
period  which  tiiey  represent.  Their  physical  characteristics  have, 
therefore,  a  special  significance.  The  skulls  are  dolichocephalic, 
with  tlie  frontal  bone  high  and  well  arched,  a  graceful  fronto- 
occipital  curve, and  well-balanced  symmetrical  proportion  through- 
out. The  profile  of  the  old  man  indicates  an  expressive  contour, 
the  face  long,  the  nose  very  prominent,  and  the  frontal  s  iiusos  but 
sliglitiy  developed  for  a  male.  The  full  face  presents  a  well-pro- 
portioned oval,  with  pointed  chin.  Tiie  one  feature  detracting 
from  its  otherwise  attractive  expression  would  seem  to  have  been 
the  unifine  cliaracter  of  tiie  long  and  narrow  eyes,  as  indicated  by 
the  nnusnal  form  of  the  orbits.  At  tlie  same  time  it  is  to  l)e  noted 
tliat  this  well  proportioned  iiead  bears  ample  evidence  of  the  ex- 
posed life  of  the  wild  hunter.  Tiie  features  are  rugged,  as  of  one 
subject,  througii  a  long  life,  to  all  the  hardsliips  of  a  rigorous  cli- 
mate ;  and  numerous  strongly  marked  iini)reHsions  of  muscular  in- 
sertions accord  witii  tlie  conditions  of  savage  life. 

This  is  the  type  of  an  altogether  remarkable  prehistoric  people, 
the  artistic  race  of  the  paheolithic  era,  to  wiiose  skill  we  owe  the 
contoinporary  etchings  iind  cinvings  oC  flic  inannnoth,  the  fossil- 
horse,  the  reindeer,  and  other  nianinials  of   (iiat  strangely  reniole 


h 


<? 


} 


f&y^V^ 


A 


.i^' 


SECTION   OF   ANTHKOPOLOGY. 


25 


era,  when  the  conditions  of  life  in  southern  France  most  nearly 
resembled  those  of  Rupert's  Land  or  Labrador  at  the  present  day. 
Some  of  their  artistic  efforts  embrace  vegetable  as  well  as  animal 
life  ;  and  in  their  graphic  outlines,  there  is  a  freedom  of  handling, 
an  eye  for  perspective,  and  even  what  may  truly  be  called  an 
inventive  skill,  altogether  remarkable  in  a  people  ignorant  of 
metallurgy,  and  living  in  the  condition  of  rudest  hunter  life. 

Such  are  the  characteristics  of  the  cave  men  recovered  from  the 
rock-shelter  of  Cro-magnon,  in  the  valley  of  the  Vcs—e,  lying 
above  the  long  accumulated  debris  which  proved  the  palajolithic 
era  of  its  occupants.  These  ancient  hunters  of  the  Garonne  and 
the  Pyrenees,  the  contemporaries  of  the  mammoth  and  other 
extinct  mammals,  and  of  the  grizly  bear,  musk-sheep,  reindeer, 
and  other  species  now  existing  only  in  extreme  northern  latitudes, 
had  occupied  the  cave  throughout  a  prolonged  period.  The  char- 
coal deposits  prove  the  kindling  of  their  fires  through  long  series  of 
years  ;  with  recurring  intervals  of  considerable  duration.  Inter- 
mingled with,  and  overlying,  the  beds  of  charcoal,  are  flint  imple- 
ments, broken  bones,  and  the  like  debris  of  a  savage  hunter's 
dwelling :  in  this  respect  presenting  considerable  resemblance  to 
the  site  of  an  Eskimo  settlement.  Those  accumulations  went  on 
until  the  cave  was  filled  up  so  nearly  to  the  roof  that  the  hunter 
could  no  longer  even  crawl  into  it  for  shelter ;  and  tlien  it  was 
devoted  to  its  final  use  as  a  place  of  sepulture.  Had  the  human 
remains  recovered  under  such  circumstances  been  characterized  by 
extreme  development  of  the  superciliary  ridges,  a  low,  narrow, 
retreating  forehead,  and  other  brutish  characteristics  assigned  to 
the  "Canstadt  race,"  there  would  probably  have  been  no  question- 
ing the  assumption  that  in  them  we  have  the  type  of  the  earlier 
I'aliuolithic  occupants  of  the  cave  :  the  artistic  hunters,  to  whose 
skill  we  owe  the  spirited  life-sketch  of  the  mammoth  found  in  the 
noighboriug  La-Madelainc  Cave,  engraved  on  a  plate  of  mammoth 
ivory.  But  the  hypothesis  adopted  by  Professor  Boyd  Dawkins 
that  the  clew  to  the  ethnology  of  the  palaBolithic  race  of  the  Caves 
is  recovered  by  the  identification  of  tlu;  ancient  tool-makers  with 
the  Kskimo,  could  only  be  maintained  by  assigning  the  iuunan  re- 
mains to  a  later  age  than  the  tuiderlying  debris.  He  accordingly 
rejects  the  opinion,  so  consistent  with  the  general  evidence  whicli 
has  satisfied  M.  M.  Lartet,  Ilaniy,  l)e  Quatrel'ages,  and  other 
ecjuully  (lualiUed  judges,  that  iu  the  old  man  of  Cro-magnon  we 


..^^te^.. 


I 


26 


ADDRESS    BY    DANIEL   WILSON, 


have  tlie  type  of  the  palaeolithic  race  contemporary  with  the 
mammoth :  the  artistic  sculptors  and  draftsmen  of  that  remote 
European  era. 

In  discussing  the  fascinating  idea  which  would  recover,  in  the 
hyperboreans  of  our  own  northern  frontiers,  the  men  of  the 
same  migratory  race  that,  before  the  close  of  the  pleistocene  age, 
followed  the  musk-sheep  and  the  reindeer  into  their  northern  haunts. 
Professor  Dawkins  reviews  the  manners  and  habits  of  the  Eskimo, 
a  race  of  hunters,  fishers,  and  fowlers,  accumulating  round  their 
dwellings  vast  refuse  heaps  similar  to  those  of  the  cave-men  of 
ancient  Europe.  The  implements  and  weapons  of  both  do  indeed 
prove  that  their  manner  of  life  was  the  same  ;  and  as  he  notes  the 
use  at  times  by  the  Eskimo  of  fossil  mammoth  ivory  for  the  han- 
dles of  their  stone  scrapers,  he  adds  :  ^'itis  very  possible  that  this 
habit  of  the  Eskimos  may  have  been  handed  down  from  the  late 
pleistocene  times."  But  what  strikes  him  as  "the  most  astonishing 
bond  of  union  between  the  cave-men  and  the  Eskimos  is  tlie  art 
of  representing  animals  ;"  and  after  noting  those  familiar  to  both., 
along  with  the  correspondence  in  their  weapons,  and  habits  as 
hunters,  he  says:  "all  these  points  of  connection  between  the 
cave-men  and  the  Eskimos  can,  in  my  opinion,  be  explained  only 
on  the  hypothesis  that  they  belong  to  the  same  race." 

The  hypothesis  is  a  bold  one  which  would  thus  assign  to  the  rude 
arctic  hunters  of  this  continent  a  pedigree  and  lineage  compared 
with  which  that  of  the  Pharaohs  is  but  of  yesterday.  To  the  ge- 
ologist who  fully  realizes  all  that  is  implied  in  the  slow  retreat  of 
the  paltEolithic  race  of  the  valley  of  the  Vosore  over  submerging 
continents  since  ingulfed  in  the  Atlantic,  and  through  changing 
glacial  and  sub-glacial  ages,  to  their  latest  home  on  the  verge  of 
the  pole,  the  time  may  sulllce  for  any  amount  of  change  in  the 
physical  characteristics  of  the  race.  But  if  these  have  vanished 
how  is  the  lineal  descendant  of  the  palaiolithic  cave-mon  to  be 
identified?  Not  by  mere  imitative  art;  for  that  is  common  to 
many  widely  dissimilar  races  of  tiio  American  continent.  Profes- 
sor Dawkins  says  truly  of  the  cave-man,  "  he  [jossessed  a  singular 
talent  for  representii','  the  animals  he  hunted  ;  and  his  sketches 
reveal  to  us  that  he  had  a  capacity  for  seeing  the  beauty  and  grace 
of  natural  form  not  much  inferior  to  that  which  is  the  result  of 
long-continuod  civilization  in  ourselves,  and  very  much  highui  than 
that  of  his  successors  iu  Europe  in  the  Neolithic  age.     The  hunter 


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SECTION   OF    ANTHROPOLOGY. 


27 


who  was  both  artist  and  sculptor,  wlio  reproduced  with  his  imper- 
feet  means  at  one  time  foliage,  at  another  the  quiet  repose  of  a 
reindeer  feeding,  has  left  behind  the  proof  of  a  decided  advance 
in  culture,  such  as  might  be  expected  to  result  from  the  long  con- 
tinuance of  man  on  the  earth  in  the  hunter  state  of  civilization." 
All  this  is  correct  in  reference  to  the  art  of  the  Cro-magnon  car- 
vers and  engravers,  and  seems  in  full  accordance  with  the  fine 
heads  and  great  cerebral  development  of  the  ancient  race  ;  but  it 
would  be  gross  exaggeration  if  applied  to  such  conventional  art  as 
the  Eskimo  arrow-straightener  which  Professor  Davvkins  figures, 
with  its  formal  row  of  reindeer  and  their  grotesque  accessories. 
The  same  criticism  is  equally  applicable  to  numerous  other  speci- 
mens of  Eskimo  art,  and  to  similar  Innuit,  or  western  Eskimo  rep- 
resentations of  hunting  scenes,  such  as  those  figured  by  our 
associate  Mr.  William  H.  Dall,  in  his  "Alaska,"  which  he  de- 
scri'oes  as  "drawings  analogous  to  those  discovered  in  France  in 
the  caves  of  Dordogne." 

Tlie  imitative  faculty  and  artistic  skill  of  the  old  Mound- 
builder  race  are  very  familiar  to  us  ;  and  have  furnished  valuable  evi- 
dence of  a  knowledge  by  them  of  a  tropical  fauna,  including  ani- 
mals of  the  southern  continent,  suggestive  of  the  probable  direc- 
tion of  their  own  migrations,  and  their  consequent  aflinity  to 
•southern  races.  Within  our  own  Canadian  Dominion  the  arts 
of  the  Queen  Charlotte  islanders  are  no  less  worthy  of  note. 
Their  curiously  conventional  style  is  shown  alike  in  their  idols, 
or  manitous,  elaborately  carved  in  black  argillaceous  stone,  and 
in  the  corresponding  decorations  of  their  lodges.  In  front  of  each 
Haida  dwelling  stands  an  ornamented  column  formed  in  many 
cases  of  the  trunk  of  a  tree  large  enough  to  admit  of  the  door- 
way being  cut  through  its  substance.  This  column,  or  obelisk,  is 
carved  throughout  its  whole  length  in  their  peculiar  conventional 
style  of  ornamentation,  suggestive  at  times  of  afllnities  to  Pe- 
ruvian sculpture  ;  or,  again,  of  borrowed  art  of  possible  Japanese 
origin.  But  aheadj'  the  imitalive  faculty  of  tlie  Ilaida  artist  loads 
him  to  revert  to  European  models  ;  his  traditional  patterns  and  de- 
vices will  speedily  be  among  the  lost  arts  of  this  continent,  and  the 
race  itself,  it  is  to  l)e  feared,  is  doomed  lo  speedy  extinction.  All 
the  more  urgent  is  it  that  no  time  shall  be  lost  in  tlie  accumulation 
of  every  available  fact,  antl  illustrative  specimen  of  their  curious 
art.     Already  a  valuable  eontril)Ution  to»this  has  been  furnished  in 


F^^>ia;ggr?g*ia5.«^^S^---;i'ifft»»  ■■"  nw 


28 


ADDRESS   BT    DANIRL   WILSON, 


Dr.  George  M.  Dawson's  "Report  on  the  Queen  Charlotte  Islands," 
published  as  one  of  the  Reports  of  the  Geological  Survey  of  Can- 
ada. 

The  Tawatin  Indians  on  the  Fraser  River  work  with  no  less  in- 
genious skill,  and  in  a  like  style  of  combined  imitative  and  conven- 
tional art,  suggestive  at  times  of  curious  analogies  to  some  of  the 
finished  sculptures  of  Yucatan.  Some  of  their  ivory  carvings  are 
executed  with  a  minute  delicacy  of  workmanship  such  as  no  Eskimo 
carver  could  surpass  ;  but  with  the  same  kind  of  conventional  or- 
namentation as  is  in  use  by  the  Ilaida  artists,  strongly  suggestive 
of  inherited  modes  of  thought,  and  traces  of  intercourse  or  re- 
lationship with  the  ancient  civilized  races  of  Central  America. 

There  is  thus  no  need  to  assume  for  the  imitative  arts  of  the 
New  World  a  European  source  in  the  remote  dawn  of  pleistocene 
times.  Nor  is  the  identity  discernible  between  certain  harpoons 
and  other  implements  of  the  ancient  hunters  of  Central  Europe  and 
those  of  the  arctic  Americans  of  our  own  day  much  more  demon- 
strative of  derived  arts  or  community  of  race.  Within  the  compara- 
tively narrow  range  of  needful  weapons  or  implements,  the  cor- 
respondence notable  between  some  of  those  of  the  palaeolithic 
cave-men  and  of  the  Eskimo  amounts  to  little  more  than  what  is 
seen  in  flint  arrowheads,  stone  hammers,  and  the  more  common 
primitive  tools  of  all  kinds,  executed  under  nearly  similar  condi- 
tions of  life.  "The  absence  of  pottery"  proves  little  more  than 
the  absence  of  tropical  vegetation  ;  fo.  both  were  nearly  equally 
impossible  under  the  conditions  of  climate.  The  preference  for 
bone  and  ivory  as  the  materials  for  their  arts  is  etjually  due  to 
climatic  conditions  which  render  rock  and  flint  generally  inacces- 
sible througiiout  the  greater  part  of  the  year.  The  points  of 
agreement  are,  in  truth,  little  more  than  are  to  be  anticipated 
among  savage  tribes  living  under  similar  conditions  of  climate. 

It',  however,  the  skulls  of  the  Cro-mugnon  cave-men  resembled 
those  of  tlie  Eskimo,  or  the  underlying  debris  revealed  any  traces 
of  crania  of  the  Eskimo  type,  there  would  then  be  good  reason 
for  giving  consideration  to  tlie  bearing  of  any  supplementary  evi- 
dence depending  on  correspondence  in  arts,  usages  and  habits. 
But  neither  the  Cro-magnon  cave,  nor  any  other  of  the  caverns 
of  the  district,  otherwise  so  rich  in  arcliti'ological  and  paiivonlo- 
logical  traces,  have  yielded  the  needful  evidence.  Th»i  contrast 
between  the  large,  well  developed  Cro-magnon  race  and  the  stunted, 


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SECTION   O"   ANTHROrOLC  GT. 


29 


almost  dwarfish  Eskimo  at  once  attracts  attention.  But  much 
greater  difference  in  stature  would  find  ready  solution  in  the  priva- 
tions of  an  arctic  habitat  prolonged  through  unnumbered  ages. 
The  notable  fiict,  however,  is  the  absolute  contrast  in  every  respect. 
The  Eskimo  physiognomy  is  of  a  poor  Mongolian  type.  The  nose 
is  flat,  and  the  cheek  bones  are  very  prominent ;  the  tendency  in 
the  skull  istowards  an  acrocephalic  form,  narrow  and  long,  with  the 
parietal  bones  frequently  meeting  at  an  angle  at  the  sagittal  su- 
ture. The  one  possible  point  of  resemblance  that  could  be  sug- 
gested with  any  acceptance  would  be  the  eye,  which  in  the  Eskimo 
seems  often  narrow  and  oblique.  This,  however,  may  be  apparent 
only,  traceable  to  the  habits  of  a  people  one-half  of  whose  year  is  an 
unbroken  midnight ;  and  who  grope  in  the  darkness  of  their  ob- 
scurely lighted  snowhuts.  Certain  it  is  that  the  long,  narrow  orbits 
of  the  Cro-magnon  skulls  are  not  represented  in  tlie  modern  crania. 
Sufficiently  extensive  opportunities  of  studying  the  Eskimo  cra- 
nium have  come  within  my  reach  to  afford  me  some  fair  means 
of  forming  an  idea  of  the  predominant  type.  In  1862,  through 
the  kind  services  of  the  late  Dr.  J.  Aitken  Meigs,  I  enjoyed 
the  advantage  of  carefully  examining  a  series  of  one  hundred 
and  twenty-five  skulls,  obtained  by  Dr.  Hayes  during  his  Arctic 
exolorations,  and  making  drawings  of  some  of  the  most  marked 
examples.  I  have  also  examined  and  taken  careful  measurements 
of  other  examples  including  Western  Eskimo,  Innuit,  and  Tsehukt- 
chi  crania,  in  the  collections  at  Washington.  With  the  resulting 
impressions  in  mind,  it  is  impossible  to  look  on  casts  of  the  large 
and  finely  developed  Cro-magnon  skulls  now  in  my  possession 
without  being  struck  with  the  extreme  contrast  between  them  and 
the  Eskimo  crania.  No  wonder  that  tliey  prove  a  stumbling  block 
to  evolutionists,  who  look  for  something  of  a  totally  opposite 
character  in  the  Troglodytes  of  the  pala3olithic,  or  pleistocene  age. 
M.  M.  Lartet,  Ilamy,  De  (^uatrcfages,  the  editors  of  the  IMiquim 
ylquitanica',  and  other  equally  competent  autlioritiea,  have  ha  1  no 
didlculty  in  accepting  the  evidence  that  the  reindeer  hunters  of  the 
Vcsiue  lay  there  intombed  in  the  cave  which  had  so  long  been  a 
shelter  to  men  of  the  same  race.  Had  the  Neanderthal  skull  been 
found  under  similar  circumstances,  no  doubt,  founded  on  its  lower 
cerol)ral  capacily,  would  have  interfered  to  prevent  its  recognition 
as  the  type  of  the  artist  race  to  wliicli  we  owe  tlie  life-picture  of  the 
UKunmoth.     But  Professor  Dawkins  not  only  notes  that  tlie  human 


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30      ADDRESS  BT  DANIEL  WILSON,    SECTION   OP   ANTHUOPOLOGT. 

remains  were  deposited  in  an  abandoned  palseolitliic  cave,  when  it 
Lad  been  nearly  filled  up  with  the  accumulated  debris  of  successive 
occupants ;  but  he  assigns  the  remains  to  the  later  Neolithic  age, 
notwithstanding  the  absence  of  any  accompanying  relics  of  the 
art  of  the  polished  stone  period. 

But  I  have  already  exceeded  the  reasonable  limits  of  an  ad- 
dress to  this  Section  of  Anthropology,  and  must  leave  unnoticed 
various  further  points  in  reference  to  the  aborigines  of  the  Do- 
minion, illustrative  alike  of  the  physical  characteristics  of  our  native 
Canadian  tribes,  and  of  some  special  points  of  significance  in 
relation  to  their  arts.  One  deduction,  however,  may  be  worthy  of 
future  consideration.  If  it  be  a  fact  borne  out  by  much  indepen- 
dent evidence,  that  from  the  extremest  northern  range  of  the 
arctic  Eskimo,  southward  to  the  Great  Lakes,  and  beyond  this, 
especiallj'  to  the  east  of  the  Alleghany  Mountains,  amid  consid- 
erable diversity  of  ethnical  characteristics,  the  dolichocephalic  type 
of  head  prevailed ;  whereas  among  more  southern  tribes,  such  as 
the  Osages,  Ottoes,  Missouris,  Dacotas,  Cherokces,  Seminoles, 
Creeks,  and  many  others,  including  the  Florida  Indians,  the  short, 
rounded,  or  brachycephalic  head  appears  to  have  been  universal : 
this  seems  to  point  to  a  convergence  of  two  distinct  ethnical  lines 
of  migration  from  opposite  centres.  In  this,  as  I  believe,  the  evi- 
dence thus  derived  from  physical  characteristics  confirms  what 
is  indicated  by  wholly  independent  evidence  of  language,  tradi- 
tional customs,  and  native  arts. 


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